Washington Residents Donate 6.8M Meals To Northwest Harvest

EDMONDS, WA - Lisa Kaye Utz has for the past three years helped out with the annual Northwest Harvest winter food drive by recruiting business-owning friends and acquaintances to host Northwest Harvest food donation boxes at their locations around Edmonds, Lynnwood, and Mountlake Terrace. This year, Utz's efforts saw four of five food boxes completely filled, which is equivalent to roughly 350 meals.

The overall 2018 food drive campaign by Northwest Harvest was actually record-breaking, with enough food donated throughout Washington to provide nearly 6.8 million meals to folks who need it most, according to Northwest Harvest spokesman Jordan Rubin.

Hundreds of food drives put together by even more volunteers and invested community members like Utz, Rubin said, helped contribute to a total count of 6,795,753 meals.

"It's a lot of littles that add up to a big — and it all makes a big difference in our communities," Rubin told Patch on Friday. "Even just one meal feeds someone, and that can't be understated."

According to Northwest Harvest, 1 in 8 Washington residents experience food insecurity and hunger on a regular — if not daily — basis, leaving them deprived of their basic nutritional needs; additionally, 1 in 5 children in Washington live in homes that constantly struggle to make nutritional food available.

Thanks to businesses and volunteers who coordinate at a grass roots level, however, Northwest Harvest sees its community-driven food drives support a statewide network of 375 food banks, meal programs, and high-need schools, Rubin said. If the current giving trend continues over the next few years, Northwest Harvest could very well meet its goal to cut Washington’s current food insecurity rate to 1 in 16 by 2028.

To meet that goal, Northwest Harvest will continue to need the support of local communities.

For Utz, it's just empowering to give back, she said.

Humbly describing herself as "just an interested resident," Utz told Patch she contacted four different businesses last year to see if they'd be interested in hosting a food donation box for the annual drive. Cask and Trotter barbecue and SuperFit gym in Lynnwood, Harvey's Lounge in Edmonds, The Getaway Tavern in Mountlake Terrace all agreed to participate.

"We tried to make it as easy as possible for people. So in addition to being locally owned, the businesses we chose this time typically have the same customers come in multiple times per week," Utz explained. "Donations were made by locals in support of locals. We all do our part."

Northwest Harvest, for its part, does its best to keep those local donations in the areas where they were made — that is, Western Washington donations stay in Western Washington and so forth, Rubin said. As the only statewide, independent, nonprofit food bank distributor, however, sometimes food donations can get combined, he said.

Nevertheless, with well more than 6 million meals to come out of this season's food drive, reaching its ambitious goal of ending hunger in Washington seems all the more possible.

"Northwest Harvest extends its gratitude to Lisa and all those like her who have a drive to make a difference," Rubin said.

To get involved and advocate or to host a food drive in your area, visit NorthwestHarvest.org.

(Sign up for our free daily newsletters and Breaking News Alerts for the Edmonds Patch)

Images via Lisa Kaye Utz