New Year's Holiday Hours

As we wish everyone a safe and happy New Year's celebration, here's just a reminder of holiday closures:

Friday, Dec. 31:
Lakes Area FISH—Closed.
Graham/South Hill FISH—Open 10 am-1:30 pm
Southeast FISH—Open 10 am-2 pm
FISH Administrative Office—Open 9 am-1 pm

Saturday, Jan. 1:
Edgewood FISH—Closed
NW Tacoma FISH—Closed

All locations will resume normal hours beginning Monday, Jan.3, 2011, except Southeast FISH, which will reopen on Wednesday, Jan. 5.

Happy New Year from FISH Food Banks!

Christmas Cheer at Graham/South Hill

Thank you, thank you, thank you to the wonderful women of the Moms Club of South Hill, who gave so generously of themselves to provide a Merrier Christmas for clients of Graham/South Hill FISH. Not only did they donate toys, gifts and funds, they also gave their time to help set up and staff the Christmas giveaway that provided Christmas gifts to more than 75 families.
Thanks also go to Graham Fire & Rescue, Toray Composites and Holy Disciples Catholic Church, who also helped supply toys and gifts for the Christmas giveaway.
About the Moms Club . . .

Southeast FISH featured in the News Tribune

Did you see our wonderful Southeast FISH staff and volunteers featured in Monday's News Tribune? Check it out!
Southeast FISH is by far our busiest food bank, serving more than 15,000 people each month. We couldn't do it without the dozens of dedicated volunteers who pick up food donations, repack food, stock the shelves and make sure clients are greeted with a smile. We are so grateful for all you do!

Bags of Hope!

Shopping out in the South Hill area? The South Hill Fred Meyer (17404 Meridian East) will be holding a "Bags of Hope" food drive this Saturday, Nov. 20, from 11:00 am-3:00 pm to benefit Graham/South Hill FISH. Purchase a pre-packed grocery bag of items at any register and drop it off at the FISH donation van parked out front of the Grocery Entrance.

Lakewood Area Connection Center is now open!

Many thanks to all who attended yesterday's Opening Celebration for our newest Connection Center, at the Lakes Area FISH Food Bank. This latest in our Connection Center partnership with South Sound Outreach Services was made possible by a grant from the Bank of America Charitable Foundation. 
Rick Larson, Market President, South Sound Region, Bank of America, was on hand to make the official presentation of the $50,000 check, which provides not only for the Lakewood Area Connection Center, but also for another planned to open at Northwest Tacoma FISH within the next month or two.

The opening of the new Connection Center is especially timely given that Lakes Area FISH is now by far our fastest-growing site, with a whopping 84% increase in clients since last year. In August alone we served more than 4,000 individuals at Lakes.

Beth Elliott of FISH Food Banks, Rick Larson of Bank of America, and Roberta Marsh of South Sound Outreach Services are pictured at the Lakewood Connection Center Opening Celebration.

Bob Badgley will be the SSOS outreach specialist at the Lakewood site.

Art-a-Thon nets over $800 for NW Tacoma FISH

Carolyn Burt and Felicity Devlin

Our friends Carolyn Burt, of the Proctor Art Gallery, and Felicity Devlin, of the Proctor Farmers Market, stopped by today to deliver the donations collected at this year's Proctor Art-a-Thon. Despite the bad economy and inclement weather, the event netted $812 dollars to supply fresh fruit and produce for the NW Tacoma FISH Food Bank.  Many, many thanks to both of you and all the wonderful artists who participated in this great event!

Recipe demos at FISH Food Banks

During the month of August, FISH Food Banks will be hosting a series of recipe demos by Celeste Greenwood, a nutrition educator with Washington State University Pierce County Extension. Celeste will be sharing food samples, recipes and ideas for utilizing ingredients typically available at the food banks. The demo schedule is as follows:

How to Store Lettuce / Low Fat Yogurt Dressing
Graham FISH, August 11, 2:00-6:00 p.m.

Ground Turkey Recipes
Lakes Area FISH, August 6, 1:00-5:00 p.m.
Edgewood FISH, August 7, 11:00 a.m.-2:00 p.m.
Graham FISH, August 18, 2:00-6:00 p.m.

Rice and Beans Recipes 
Southeast FISH, August 9, 1:30-4:00 p.m.
Bread Box FISH, August 9, 5:00-7:00 p.m.
Lakes Area FISH, August 13, 1:00-5:00 p.m.
Edgewood FISH, August 14, 11:00 a.m.-2:00 p.m.
Graham FISH, August 25, 2:00-6:00 p.m.

Oatmeal Recipes
Southeast FISH, August 16, 1:30-4:00 p.m.
Bread Box FISH, August 16, 5:00-7:00 p.m.
Lakes Area FISH, August 17, 1:00-5:00 p.m.
Edgewood FISH, August 21, 11:00 a.m.-2:00 p.m.

Art for Food

Carolyn Burt at Art-a-Thon 2010

Many, many thanks to the wonderful and talented artists who participated in Saturday's Art-a-Thon at the Proctor Farmers' Market. Despite cool temperatures and gray skies, they brightened up the day with their art and demonstrations, collecting pledges and donations to provide fresh fruits and vegetables to NW Tacoma FISH.  Special thanks to the Proctor Art Gallery and the Proctor Farmers' Market for all their support, and to the participating artists: Tom Bona, Mary Wolfe, Sharon Crocetti, Alexis St. John, Carolyn Burt, Kristin Haakenson, Marquita Hunt and Deb Morris.

Shopping smarter

In these tough economic times, we're all trying to save money wherever we can. Here at FISH, we supplement our donated food with purchased food, and we've think we've gotten pretty good at stretching our food purchasing dollars as much as we can -- for every dollar we receive, we're now able to distribute $7 worth of food.  But we've made a new acquaintance who's really a champion at stretching her shopping dollars. Angela Russell's blog, The Coupon Project, is a treasure trove of ideas for saving money by using coupons and shopping smarter.  Check it out! 

George Winston in Tacoma

The great George Winston, pianist extraordinaire, is coming to Tacoma and we're excited to announce that FISH Food Banks will be the beneficiary of a food drive at his concert.

The show will be held on Friday, September 10 at 8:00 p.m. at the Rialto Theater; tickets are available from the Broadway Center for the Performing Arts.

George Winston's latest solo piano release is Love Will Come – The Music of Vince Guaraldi, Vol. 2, which features compositions by the late jazz pianist, including pieces from the Peanuts® TV specials. It is a follow-up to his acclaimed 1996 CD, Linus & Lucy-The Music of Vince Guaraldi, which included some of Guaraldi's best-known work, including "Cast Your Fate to the Wind" and pieces from the Peanuts® TV specials. Other solo piano releases include Autumn (1980); Winter Into Spring (1982); December (1982); Summer (1991); Forest (1994 - a Grammy Award winner for Best New Age Album); Plains (1999),  inspired by his Eastern Montana upbringing; Night Divides the Day - The Music of the Doors (2002); Montana - A Love Story (2004) and Gulf Coast Blues & Impressions – A Hurricane Relief Benefit (2006).

Harvest of pennies yields food for hungry people

Our Graham/South Hill FISH site was delighted to receive a check for $1000 from the students of Spanaway's Cedarcrest Jr. High. The students participated in a national educational program called Penny Harvest. What makes the Penny Harvest unique is that students not only collect pennies to support worthy causes, they also turn those pennies into grants for community organizations.  As part of their learning, the students form Philanthropy Roundtables to study community problems and determine which organizations can best address those problems. The students themselves select these community organizations to receive grant money from their penny drives. The Cedarcrest students' Applied Algebra Philanthropy Roundtable selected FISH Food Banks to receive their grant.  A big thanks to all of the students at Cedarcrest for your generosity -- we are so honored to be chosen for this grant!

Intel employees garden for food banks

Intel is a high-tech business. Its employees are immersed in cutting-edge technology. But beyond their technological expertise, Intel employees are digging in the dirt -- literally!-- to make their community a better place.


The Intel DuPont Community Gardens began last year as the brainchild of Stu Vannerson, then an engineering manager at Intel. While doing a community service project with other Intel employees at an organic farm in Olympia, Stu began to wonder whether some the spare acreage at Intel's DuPont location could be put to better use. He found other employees who shared his enthusiasm, and they started planning.

Local businesses helped with donations and discounts for topsoil and lumber, and the first five beds were built on August 1. With the first harvest in November, employee interest and support grew rapidly.

Now there are 22 raised beds and about a dozen other planter boxes, which Stu anticipates could yield about 2,000 pounds of produce this year for food banks in Pierce and Thurston Counties. Each of the beds is sponsored by a participating Intel department. That department's employee team makes all of the decisions -- what to plant, when to plant, how to set up a watering schedule, where to donate their produce -- and do all of the work themselves.


Intel initially supported the employees' effort by putting in underground irrigation and setting up a 120' x 180' fence around the gardens. "Now that they've seen that the employees are serious and can sustain this, they ask us what else we could use," says Vannerson.

In March of this year, the Intel DuPont Community Gardens received its 501 (c) (3) designation as a nonprofit organization. Now retired from Intel after 30 years, Stu Vannerson remains a director of the garden project. He says employees are so excited about what they've accomplished so far that they keep bringing him new ideas for how to expand the gardens' reach and impact. "It's great to see people who deal every day in nanoseconds get so excited about getting their hands dirty and finding it such meaningful work."


We here at FISH are excited too, and very grateful for the produce that the gardens have begun contributing to our Lakes Area FISH Food Bank. Congratulations to Stu and to all the generous Intel employees who have made this project possible!

Thanks to St. Luke's!

The good folks at St. Luke's Memorial Episcopal Church in Tacoma's North End ran a special drive for FISH Food Banks. Instead of a food drive they decided to help us stock up on non-food essentials, so they conducted a toilet paper drive.
Toilet paper and other necessary non-food items are always in short supply at the food banks, and are always needed because such items are not covered by food stamps. Thanks so much to all the folks at St. Luke's for their generosity! Together they collected more than 1250 rolls of TP - far outpacing their original goal of 250 rolls.

More seniors relying on food banks

According to the Emergency Food Assistance Program, the number of seniors in Washington state relying on food banks relying on food banks has risen 22% just in the past two years.

There's some good news, though. With the summer farmers market season getting underway, the Senior Farmers Market Nutrition Program offers eligible low-income seniors a way to access nutritious fresh fruit and vegetables. The program, which operates June through October, supplies fresh produce in two ways:
seniors can redeem farmers market checks for up to $40 worth of produce at authorized farmers markets or roadside stands, or, local produce is purchased directly from farmers and delivered to eligible homebound seniors or to meal sites and senior housing for pick up by seniors.

The program not only provides seniors a way to eat healthier, but also offers the fun and social interaction of visiting the local farmers market. It also helps to support local farming by encouraging the use of farmers markets and roadside produce stands.

To be eligible for the Senior Farmers Market Nutrition Program, you must be age 60 or over and have an income less than 185% of the Federal Poverty Level ($1,669.63 per month for one person in 2010). For more information and program contacts, see the program webpage.

(Information courtesy of Energize Newsletter for Nutrition Educators, published by the Washington State University Nutrition Education Network. Read the latest issue here.)

Maurice the Fish rocked the house . . .

AND raised more than $5,000 to help FISH Food Banks feed hungry people across Pierce County!

Pastor Heather James welcomed all the attendees and musicians on behalf of Westminster Presbyterian Church, and then turned the mike over to emcee Cliff Lenderman of the Lenderman Academy of Martial Arts.

The music began with a video from Kim Archer, whose gorgeous acoustic rendition of "Unchain My Heart" got the show off to a rousing start.

Then the JNC Trio took the stage, making their debut as a band and marking the evening's first appearance by the amazing multi-instrumentalist/vocalist Nick Sandy, who performed with most of the evening's acts. The trio rocked a set of covers and originals.

Drummer Eric Montgomery demonstrated his versatility with a solo piano/vocal set featuring a beautiful rendition of Elton John's "Your Song" and his own original compositions.

Backed by the JNC Trio's Chad Russell and Nick Sandy, Savannah opened her set with Missy Higgins' "Where I Stood," before moving into original songs, including a couple from her Reaching Serenity CD.

At intermission, Cliff Lenderman led the freewill donation for FISH Food Banks, and we were bowled over by the generosity of the folks in the crowd.

The amazing Rikk Beatty kicked off the second half of the show with his trademark power guitar sound, and then Nick Sandy took the stage for a solo set.

Raymond Hayden and the Dark Drive Home followed with their own original material, and then backed up the evening's final act, Danielle Egnew, as she provided a rocking close to the festivities.

We at FISH are immensely grateful to Raymond Hayden for organizing this wonderful event, to all the musicians who donated their time and talent, to the audience members who were so generous with their donations, and to the sponsors who provided support and door prizes: The Tempest, Tacoma Rainiers, Leatherman, Silver City Restaurant and Brewery, The Matador, and McCormick Woods.

Cookbook sales benefit FISH

Proceeds from the sale of a new cookbook will benefit FISH Food Banks. The self-proclaimed "Iron Chefs of General Plastics," a group of seven co-workers, have created their own cookbook, What's Cookin' at GP. The seven -- Cindy Bohnert, Adam Blanchard, Rory Endsley, Carenna Lan, Jerry Langston, Bob Coty and Shelly Holland -- were selected by their employer, General Plastics Manufacturing of Tacoma, to attend a college course in Manufacturing Management Teamwork Essentials. They decided to compile a book of their favorite recipes as their class project.

In their book, they write:

We, the authors of this book, consider ourselves to be extremely fortunate that we are employed and able to put food on our tables for ourselves and our families while so many in our community cannot. For this reason, we've decided to use some of the proceeds from this book to help our neighbors put food on their tables.

We will donate a majority of the profits from the sale of this book to FISH Food Banks of Pierce County.

And we at FISH are very grateful for their generosity! The book sells for $10 and we will have copies available for sale at the FISH Food Benefit Concert on Saturday, May 1 at Westminster Presbyterian Church.

Happy Day!

Great news for a beautiful spring day! Just heard from the Boeing Employees Community Fund that our funding request has been approved, so very soon we will have a bright shiny new truck to better service our seven food bank locations. Many, many thanks to the generous Boeing employees!

Rocking for FISH

This week's Tacoma Weekly includes a great feature story on the upcoming FISH Food Benefit Concert. The third annual benefit will be held on Saturday, May 1 from 6-9 pm at Tacoma's Westminster Presbyterian Church. Come join us to hear artists from Maurice the Fish Records offer an eclectic evening of music. Scheduled artists include JNC Trio, Eric Montgomery, Nick Sandy, Savannah, Raymond Hayden and the Dark Drive Home, and Danielle Egnew.

Westminster Presbyterian Church is located at 5236 East “B” Street in Tacoma. (Map) There is no admission charge; a free will offering will be collected and all proceeds will benefit FISH.

It's a family-friendly event that will offer great music and fabulous door prizes donated by sponsoring local businesses. See you there!

Thanks to Grainger

Many, many thanks to the good folks at Grainger Industrial Supply for their generous support of FISH Food Banks. Grainger representative Curtis King stopped by our new office on Friday to present a check for $5,000 in support of our work.

FISH is on the move!

Starting today, Lakes Area FISH will be serving clients at its new location, United Methodist Church at Lakewood, 6900 Steilacoom Blvd. SW in Lakewood. The food bank will also adopt new hours, open Monday 2:00 to 6:00 p.m., Wednesday and Friday 1:00 to 5:00 p.m.

After 35 years at Little Church on the Prairie, Lakes FISH has simply outgrown its longtime home. Over the past two years, Lakes FISH has nearly doubled in number of clients served, from 16,602 clients in 2008 to 24,834 in 2009.

Many, many thanks to the congregation of Little Church on the Prairie for all their support over the years. They've been a huge part of FISH's history. We're thrilled that they will continue to work with us in our new location.

And the moves haven't stopped! FISH Food Banks is also moving its main office from its current site in the Associated Ministries building to a larger space in First Tower, part of the First United Methodist Church in Tacoma.

Effective at the beginning of April, our new office address will be: FISH Food Banks, First Tower, Suite 202, 621 Tacoma Ave. S, Tacoma 98402.

Innovation Award

We were very excited to be named the winner of this year's Weyerhaeuser Company Innovation Award. Weyerhaeuser's Effenus Henderson presented the award to FISH board president Sandy Roszman on Wednesday at the 2010 Nonprofit Excellence Awards. FISH Food Banks was honored for its "creativity in finding new ways to meet community needs more effectively," specifically through our partnership with South Sound Outreach Services in our Connection Centers and through our partnership with Rotacare and others in the new chronic care clinic at Southeast FISH. Partners and board members came to celebrate the award with us:



Pictured, left to right: Nyla Redford, Mike Mowat, Janet Runbeck, Renee Housten, Barbara Reed, Jerry Lee, Sandy Roszman, Beth Elliott, Roberta Marsh.

More Easy Budget Recipes

We've found another great resource for low-cost, quick and easy recipes. The folks at St. James Episcopal Church in Cincinnati, Ohio have created a website and a downloadable cookbook called One * Pot Meals.

Editor Bernice Abel describes the book as "Good food for good people," and says her goal in putting the book together was to produce "a cookbook for people like me who use paper towels instead of napkins and wouldn’t know what a garlic press is if they got caught in one." Check it out!

Plan now for Hunger Action Day

On Friday, Jan. 29, the Anti-Hunger and Nutrition Coalition will host the annual Hunger Action Day in Olympia. This is a concrete way to fight hunger here in Washington state. Plan now to be part of the effort to make sure our legislators hear the voices of Washington's hungry children and families. For more information or to register, see the 2010 Hunger Action Day blog.

Happy New Year

It's barely 2010, and it's already shaping up to be a busy year at FISH Food Banks. The Lakewood food bank has outgrown its long-time home at Little Church on the Prairie, and is looking for a permanent site. Meanwhile, the food bank will relocate before March 1 to temporary quarters at United Methodist Church of Lakewood. Many thanks to the Pastor Bonnie Warren and her congregation for their hospitality!

The new permanent site should be at least 1,000 sq. ft. and have easy access for food loading. If you can suggest a possible site, call 253-383-3164 or email Beth Elliott.