SBC Food Action Network Member

SANTA MARIA, Calif. – 50 volunteers spread out all over Santa Maria on Thursday to deliver desperately needed groceries to 500 seniors.

The deliveries included a variety of groceries, oranges and fresh produce. The Food Bank of Santa Barbara County and the Family Services Agency offers this vital service twice a month is Santa Maria to help seniors who are sheltering at home during the COVID-19 crisis.

The Harvest Community Center in Santa Maria will be increasing its food capacity during its upcoming monthly distributions in order to provide longer-lasting supplies for more families in need during the COVID-19 pandemic.

As the shelter-at-home order continues, the demand for food supplies is on the rise.

The SLO Foodbank recently signed a contract with the county of San Luis Obispo to use emergency funding to purchase $400,000 worth of additional food.

Since mid-March, they have provided a quarter million pounds of food to the community.

Residents of Santa Barbara County are no strangers to overcoming disasters—but as reflected by statistics from the Foodbank, what the county faces now is unprecedented.

The COVID-19 crisis is also extra challenging because it impacts the entire county, making it difficult for the Foodbank to keep up.

How do you feed an entire county in a disaster situation, especially when it might not be safe to go outside?

By November 2019, the Foodbank of Santa Barbara County was already equipped to answer that question.

“Our mission is to ensure that everybody in the county of Santa Barbara has access to the healthy food they need,” said the organization’s marketing director, Judith Smith-Meyer. “We’re ready, and we have the relationships in place to help us do that.”

Like most Americans, when the severity of the coronavirus became evident, 17-year old Danny Goldberg wanted to do “something” but he felt helpless. However, unlike most of us, he quickly acted upon his desire to help and set up a volunteer service in which Zoomers (members of Generation-Z, born between 1995 and 2015) delivered groceries and other necessities to Boomers (members of the Baby Boom generation, born between 1944 and 1964), free of charge.

Lompoc Unified Food Service workers are on the frontlines of ensuring the community’s children continue to have access to breakfast and lunch, even with schools closed.

It’s been a dizzying three weeks for Daniel Goldberg and the Zoomers to Boomers grocery shopping and delivery service he created to help South Coast seniors sheltered in place and other people isolated at home.

While Goldberg and his crew of fellow high school students were hustling to make deliveries, other cities throughout the country were contacting him, inquiring how they can join in.