Thanksgiving will be a bit different for all of us this year. Many of us are planning smaller celebrations and will be unable to gather with extended family or travel. Growing levels of hunger in Massachusetts combined with the extended isolation that the pandemic has created are making this holiday season even more difficult for those already experiencing hardship.
Our team is working hard to keep Thanksgiving as celebratory as possible for the individuals and people that our food reaches.
Our Operations team has started its annual procurement of Thanksgiving “sides” to be delivered to our community partners the week of Thanksgiving. Potatoes, squashes, sweet potatoes, and cooking greens will be delivered to food pantries and other programs throughout greater Boston.
Our Programs team is adding a little something extra for our over 380 Home Delivery clients. Many of our Home Delivery clients have pre-existing health conditions and may be high risk for COVID-19. They are often unable to regularly leave their homes and many have been very isolated since March when the pandemic began. Our team wanted to add some special foods to help make our Home Delivery clients’ Thanksgiving a little more festive. Home Delivery boxes distributed the weekend before Thanksgiving will include butter–often hard to come by when you’re relying on the emergency food system–and many Thanksgiving type produce items.
While this Thanksgiving won’t look like past celebrations, we know that it’s important to stay focused on being thankful. In this very challenging year, our team has rapidly evolved our programs to meet the challenges that the pandemic has brought. This has been hard but we’ve also been buoyed by the response from our community. We have received over 3,000 volunteer requests since March from individuals and families interested in volunteering for our programs! Generous financial and food donations continue to materialize from individuals, families, businesses, community organizations, and other institutions. We couldn’t have responded to the pandemic crisis as successfully without your support. Thank you!
