El Pasoans Fighting Hunger Food Bank takes on free breakfast, lunch program

The El Pasoans Fighting Hunger Food Bank has been selected by the Texas Department of Agriculture to receive, store and distribute free and reduced-price breakfast and lunches to 182 schools in 7 counties, including El Paso County.

The food had previously been shipped from San Antonio, because there was no one here locally to do the work. At a news conference Tuesday, El Pasoans Fighting Hunger announced they had been awarded a year-long contract and would be taking on the workload.

However, changes will need to be made to the food bank’s warehouse in order to accommodate an extra estimated 2 million pounds of food.

“We have four brand new trucks on order,” El Pasoans Fighting Hunger CEO Susan Goodell said. “All of them are gifts from companies and individuals from this country and abroad who want to make sure that this program succeeds.”

In addition to that, the food bank will need to expand it’s cooler and freezer capacity.

“Currently our freezer space is not adequate for a program this size,” Goodell said. “So we have made provisions to lease off site storage while we build our own cooler and freezers.”

“We have just received the architectural drawings which were provided for us pro bono for the coolers and freezers,” Goodell added. “So we don’t yet have a price point for what these will cost but as soon as we do we will be putting those out for bid.”

Being a non-profit, El Pasoans Fighting Hunger is supported by grants, foundations and other organizations. Goodell said they’ll be looking at all sources to help fund the freezers and coolers. The food bank also hired a new warehouse manager.

“This will be additional work for the food bank but frankly, this is what we’re built for,” Goodell said. “Our job is to make sure our community has adequate food to meet the needs of vulnerable people. People like the children in this program. People like the elderly, poor. This is what we’re built for and this is what we intend to do.”

According to the El Paso Independent School District, 44,487 students receive free or or reduced-price foods daily. In the Ysleta Independent School District, 71% of their students get either free or reduced-price meals.

For more information about El Pasoans Fighting Hunger click here.