Local food bank avoids canned food shortage with donation from local Bloomberg office

The Arlington Food Assistance Center (AFAC) says it avoided a canned goods shortfall with a timely donation from Bloomberg Industry Group.

Over Labor Day weekend, the local food bank said it received more than 3,600 canned goods from the Arlington-based affiliate of Bloomberg, which provides legal, tax and business reporting and services.

In a press release, AFAC says it was facing a week-long shortage of canned food donations, which “threatened to disrupt the lifeline they provide to thousands of Arlington families.”

The donation comes as the food pantry, which serves around 3,300 Arlington families a week, is seeing an uptick in clients. It attributes the uptick to inflation and rollbacks in Covid-era federal food assistance and child tax credits.

“As demands for food assistance exponentially increase due to economic setbacks like inflation and cuts in government assistance, AFAC’s mission to provide essential resources to vulnerable families has never been more crucial,” the nonprofit said in a press release.

That need is particularly acute in South Arlington, according to a recent study, which found the area has one of the highest concentrations of families in the nation who cannot afford basic necessities and childcare.

Overall, Bloomberg Industry Group — which has hosted food drives and helped bag food for AFAC before — collected 14,290 pounds of food for distribution.

“It was our privilege to lend a helping hand to AFAC in their time of need,” says Josh Eastright, CEO of the company, which has offices in Crystal City. “We’re proud to support the great work they do serving our local community, and I want to thank our team for their generosity supporting this effort.”

Last Saturday, employees of another company with a significant local presence volunteered with a food distribution event.

Amazon employees teamed up with nonprofit Food for Neighbors, which combats child hunger in the region, to collect nearly 20,000 pounds of food and toiletries, according to a press release.

After the collection, dubbed a “Red Bag” event, the items were distributed to more than 5,800 students across 42 secondary schools across Northern Virginia, including Arlington Community High School, Gunston Middle School, Kenmore Middle School and Wakefield High School.

“We’re thrilled to partner with Amazon as a Food For Neighbors Community Champion and sponsor of our first Red Bag food and toiletry collection event of the new school year,” Karen Joseph, founder and executive director of Food For Neighbors, said in the release.

The event was part of Amazon’s Global Month of Volunteering, “when tens of thousands of Amazon employees around the world will go out in their communities and do good together,” Melissa Robinson, principal program manager of Volunteering at Amazon, said in a statement.

Amazon previously helped feed Arlington Public Schools families last fall via a $155,000 donation to Food For Neighbors from Amazon Fresh, Joseph noted.

Photo (1) via AFAC/Facebook