Ed Smith interviewed Mark Dwyer, the Director of Marketing and Communications at Foodlink.
-Mark gave an update on the success of their Festival of Food event, which continues to grow after being scaled way down during the pandemic.
-He talked about the Career Fellowship Culinary Program
– Class 8 just graduated and they are now starting to work with Class 9. This is a program that teaches students culinary skills with the hope of them obtaining a mid-level position with a local restaurant or culinary organization. During the training students get real life experience and training at the Foodlink Community Cafe and various local partner employers. The goal is for them eventually to become a chef or own their own business.
-Mark said the Community Cafe is doing well and encouraged people to check it out. He said they are still providing a “mission meal”, which is a regular full meal at a discounted rate to help people who are struggling.
-He said that last month, Foodlink hosted their annual Fall Festival which provides a day of free food, games and more for families. It also allows Foodlink to showcase their Community Farm in the Edgerton and Lyell-Otis neighborhoods. He explained that this farm is run by a few staff members from Foodlink but mostly by 65 community members that live in the area, many of whom have recently settled in the Rochester area. Mark says they are working on a long term project at the farm of building a facility that would be their Edible Education Building. This would be a space to teach young people about nutrition, healthy eating and farming.
-Mark said that the food insecurity issue in the Rochester area continues to grow. Foodlink collected data from their network of over 300 food bank members and it revealed a sharp increase in requests for food assistance. Unfortunately, this has been the trend over the last few years as federal food assistance that was provided during the pandemic has dried up and at the same time inflation was very high.
-Mark talked about their annual Check Out Hunger and Food for Families campaigns that they do with local grocery stores this time of year and how important they are to helping them fulfill their mission.
-He said their food storage facility is still under construction as they are working to add another cooler to be able to provide more fresh food for local food pantries.
-Mark said they can’t accommodate large volunteer groups because of construction but are still looking for volunteers to come in smaller groups or as an individual.