AROOSTOOK COUNTY, Maine — Power of Prevention (POP), a program of Cary Medical Center, has partnered with Catholic Charities to help expand the farming and growing capacity of Catholic Charities’ Farm for ME.
The local program provides fresh produce year-round to food pantries in all of Aroostook County by harvesting, gleaning and accepting donated food that is either distributed at that time or sent to a Van Buren microprocessor, Northern Girl, for wintertime distribution.
Through a grant award of $4,500, facilitated by POP under the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Partnerships to Improve Community Health (PICH) grant, Catholic Charities will be purchasing a disc harrow, three-point hitch sprayer, windrower/digger, and planter for their harvesting operation in Caribou.
This comes in the wake of several efforts to help move food to the food bank over the last two years, through recruitment of volunteer gleaners for Farm for ME last year and two years of support for the Good Shepherd Food Bank Food for All farmstand project in New Sweden, which donates unsold produce to the food bank.
“With funding support from the CDC Partnerships to Improve Community Health grant awarded to EMHS and in partnership with Cary Medical Center, Catholic Charities will utilize these farm garden implements to expand annual production of food to supply area food pantries,” said Catholic Charities Chief Executive Officer Stephen P. Letourneau in a letter to POP and their partners.
“Our 6-acre farm is showing exceptional results, which this year includes carrots, beets, squash and rutabagas, which are distributed year round to our partnering 24 food pantries and senior partners throughout Aroostook County. These vegetables provide a huge benefit to the most food-insecure county in the Northeast,” Letourneau said.
By supporting infrastructure improvements for Catholic Charities’ farming operations, PICH and POP will be able to assist Catholic Charities with sustainable growth and make a measurable impact, ideally, on reducing obesity rates in Aroostook County through increasing the availability of healthful local food.
Julie Daigle, past POP project director, said Dixie Shaw, Catholic Charities’ director of Hunger and Relief Services, has communicated clearly the need for support for these initiatives in this county, saying that the infrastructure and recruitment efforts have been sorely needed. Unforeseen circumstances have led to an ever-tightening budget for Catholic Charities.
“Operating capital is such a need,” Shaw said, “and with our focus on feeding the hungry the amount of money it takes to do that is astronomical. In years past our thrift stores were able to offset the costs, and when the costs grew greater we opened more stores and added the recycling efforts of bailing used clothing to ship out by the tractor trailer load.
“The stores have not done well; the past two years we have seen a decline in sales,” she said. “We also saw a dramatic crash of our recycling business. The used textile market came to an abrupt halt about two years ago and has just recently opened up, but the revenue stream is 50 percent of what it used to be. Also metal recycling prices have dropped, so all the revenue streams we had in place have created a real crisis situation for our operating capability.”
Shaw said help is needed. “I cannot say enough times, ‘It costs money to give away free food.’”
For more information about Power of Prevention, contact project director Mark Shea at mshea@carymed.org.
