FISH Food Banks granted her wish. Northeast Tacoma Elementary School Principal Anne Tsuneishi approached FISH Food Banks a while ago about starting a food bank in the neighborhood of her school where people with a high need have no access to food banks.
Northeast Tacoma Elementary School will soon become the first mobile FISH food bank site. The mobile van, currently getting a makeover, will visit the school site weekly once the program is launched.
This pilot project will be the first completely self-contained mobile food bank in Pierce County and one of only a few in the country, according to a FISH Food Banks newsletter story by Judith Jones.
One of FISH’s board members, an experienced trucker who purchased a 45-foot furniture van, spearheaded the mobile van project.
Although FISH currently has eight food-bank locations spread throughout Pierce County, pockets of poverty and high need still exist where there is no food bank access. Meanwhile, high gas prices and recent cuts in public transportation are making it much more difficult for people in underserved areas of the county to get to a food bank.
Setting up and operating a fixed food bank, even with donated space, consumes a lot of donated dollars that could otherwise be used to purchase food, Jones said. This mobile unit will have more storage and display capacity than some existing fixed food bank locations, but will be able to move to where the need is. The van can make both scheduled and special event stops, being at a different location every day and even multiple locations on the same day.