PROJECT HOPE FOOD BANK INC

Project HOPE Food Bank has three focus programs to provide the greatest impact in our community: the Food Subsidy Program, the Emergency Food Box Program, and the School Backpack Program.
The Food Subsidy Program, through effective and efficient efforts, strives to offer our nonprofit partners sustainability by lowering their food acquisition costs. Our resources provide strength to our nonprofit partners. Resources include a donated warehouse, volunteer warehouse workers (including our Executive Director, Ted Thompson), grant-obtained equipment including our refrigeration, 26’ box truck, van, pallet equipment, and large lot wholesale purchasing power. Our partners do not have the resources to purchase, inventory, and store semi-truck loads of food. Therefore, we can provide savings to all of our partners allowing them to access food at a fraction of the retail cost.
Director Ted Thompson works with 7 national food brokers and local groceries to obtain food at the most affordable cost. Purchasing food by the semi-truck load provides significant savings. Our facility, equipment, and volunteers enable the food bank to warehouse food until it is needed. To make food more affordable we take our grants and donations and provide a subsidy. This will strengthen our nonprofit partners and allow more people in need to maintain health and well-being through improved nutrition.
To help our homeless we serve feeding programs, homeless shelters, children’s homes, domestic violence shelters, and charity kitchens. Our focus is to strengthen the homeless community by offering support to allow them the opportunity to become a more productive part of our community.
Drug addiction affects not only the user but their families and loved ones. Through partnerships with the nonprofit recovery centers, we hope to help these agencies to succeed, and aid in the fight against the drug epidemic. By providing affordable food we are focused on providing strength and sustainability, allowing more people to recover.
Project HOPE Food Bank's Emergency Food Box Program has a positive impact on addressing food insecurity in the community. This initiative not only provides essential support to those in crisis but also recognizes the challenges faced by caseworkers and other professionals in managing their heavy caseloads. By having these emergency food boxes readily available, the program streamlines the process of providing food assistance, allowing caseworkers to focus more efficiently on their clients' broader needs.
This multi-agency approach not only ensures that individuals in crisis receive timely assistance but also fosters a sense of community support. We are honored to have strategically partnered with these organizations to maximize the reach of the Emergency Food Box Program.
The Emergency Food Box collaborates with 25 agencies, such as the VA Clinics, hospitals, cancer centers, DHS, schools, low-income pregnancy clinics, child advocacy, senior programs, senior housing, and others, showcasing our strong community effort to address food insecurity comprehensively. Over 1,200 boxes containing 12,000 meals were distributed in 2023. The Emergency Food Boxes are provided through grant funding at no cost to the organization. Agencies keep the food boxes on hand to distribute at their discretion.
The collaboration with various agencies, such as the VA Clinics, hospitals, cancer centers, DHS, schools, low-income Pregnancy Clinics, child advocacy, senior programs, senior housing, and others, showcases our strong community effort to address food insecurity comprehensively.
The School Backpack Program by Project HOPE Food Bank serves 1,500 school children in 18 school districts and after-school mentoring programs. The focus of this program is to allow children in food-insecure households to have the same opportunities for success as their well-fed counterparts. The program provides nutritious meals and snacks for when school meals are not available. The program is expensive because products must be individual servings, readily consumable, and nutritious, yet light enough for children to carry home in addition to schoolbooks. To make the program sustainable the food bank provides a 50% subsidy and partners each location with a church or other organization to provide the remaining funding.
Project HOPE Food Bank serves agencies in seven Arkansas Counties: Garland, Hot Spring, Montgomery, Pike, Pulaski, Saline, and Union.
The School Backpack Program is by far our fastest-growing program. Originally our School Backpack Program was designed for our local children after the collapse of a state-wide program. As word got out to other schools in other counties, many have reached out to request our assistance in feeding their children. Currently, our backpacks are feeding children in five Arkansas Counties. The schools are great partners. We can offer nutrition to help children in food-insecure households have the same opportunities for success as their well-fed counterparts. Our School Backpack Program is designed to allow each school to choose the food they feel would benefit their children. The majority of the children we serve are under the 7th grade, these are important years in the development emotionally, physically, and mentally. That said, we also partner with our local community college to alleviate hunger in our college society.
In looking ahead, we are researching the feasibility of a mobile senior-specific pantry. All of our senior subsidized housing is located in food deserts. We aim to combat seniors from rationing resources like food and medication and putting their lives at risk. We have also collaborated with CHI St. Vincent Hospital, the Arkansas Community Foundation, Arkansas Hunger Relief Alliance, and Food for Thought to host SNAP application programs. We are surveying the residents of these facilities to see their biggest challenges in obtaining food. Many have listed transportation and mobility, while it is more of a financial challenge for others. Many diseases can be traced back to food insecurity like diabetes, depression, and high blood pressure undermining their health and well-being.