Volume 5, Issue 2 - Feb./Mar. 2006
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An interview with Michael Pollan
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Keeping the SOUL in Harlem
FoodChange's S.O.U.L Food Project partners with tax program to bring community supported agriculture to Harlem.

Central Harlem is one of the poorest neighborhoods in New York City, with over a third of its primarily African-American residents living in poverty. The median household income hovers around $20,000. Affordable, nutritious foods are not readily available, and the borough’s health statistics reflect that reality—the area has above average rates of diet-related illnesses like hypertension, heart disease, diabetes, and obesity.

FoodChange, a New York City-based organization which has a location squarely in Central Harlem, tackles community issues related to food and finance. Its S.O.U.L. Food Project provides Harlem’s low-income community with access to fresh and healthy food grown by farmers in New York state. Farmers supply the Healthy Dining and Food Pantry programs at FoodChange’s Community Kitchen, located between 7th Ave. and Frederick Douglass Blvd, giving Harlem’s most food-insecure residents a fresh and healthy meal.


Recipe demonstration. Credit: FoodChange.
FoodChange is also the number one free tax preparer in the nation. Its Food and Finance Center has the single highest volume of any non commercial tax preparation site. In 2004, FoodChange prepared 25,000 returns and processed $46 million in tax refunds for low-income people, half of which came from the Earned Income Tax Credit. Earned Income Tax Credit, or EITC, is a refundable tax credit that reduces or eliminates the taxes paid by low income working people.

Funded by a Food and Society grant, the S.O.U.L. Food Project brought its FarmFresh Shares community-supported agriculture (CSA) program to the Food and Finance Center, providing discounted shares to low-income people. Throughout the tax season, S.O.U.L Food staff prepared cooking demonstrations using fresh produce for people waiting for EITC processing. With over 37,000 people coming in for tax preparation, interest in the FarmFresh Shares CSA program shot up; S.O.U.L Food needed to limit the number of participating households.

“We’re [presenting] in an environment where the consumer is receiving some money. It’s easier to think about spending $200-$350 for produce for one’s family,” says Hiram Bonner, the Program Director for FoodChange’s Harlem S.O.U.L. Food Project. “There’s an immediate understanding that ‘I’m receiving money, let me start planning what I’ll do with this money.’”

A typical share in the FarmFresh Food Shares program contains 12 to 14 pounds of fresh fruits and vegetables. Two farmers from New York’s Roxbury and Hepworth farms deliver the produce to the Community Kitchen, which is not far from the Food and Finance Center.

“We can use the EITC sites as a client vehicle,” adds Lee Davenport, the Assistant Director of FoodChange’s Income Policy program. “These sites can be a vehicle to reach a lot of people, and we use it when we can to get people more engaged.”

The S.O.U.L. Food Project pairs traditional anti-hunger work with regional food systems promotion. FoodChange’s Community Kitchen feeds nearly 700 hungry people per day; anyone is welcome to eat there. The kitchen’s reliance on upstate New York farmers for its food, however, is unique among “soup kitchens.” Although the Community Kitchen accepts canned goods, it serves whole foods to the greatest extent possible. Imagine a lunch of steamed brown rice, savory lentils, and a hearty salad. The food in the Community Kitchen rivals any of that found in New York’s healthy restaurants.

Bonner and Ann Cooper, a former Food and Society Policy Fellow, developed a model to transition an emergency food kitchen from one working with processed foods to one that cooks the food from scratch using locally produced food. Together, the two identified the following five issues to define a sequence for institutional change:

  • Transform operations to support fresh food production, not reheating and reserving.
  • Refocus training of community kitchen workers towards institutional food preparation and production.
  • Test recipes and plan menus based on seasonal foods.
  • Identify mid-sized farms that can grow the needed volume and diversity of produce, deliver those foods to Harlem, and sell their foods at fair prices.
  • Negotiate contracts with farms to supply institution throughout the growing season.

Originally, the S.O.U.L. Food Project intended to use only whole, local foods. Funding for emergency food relief in New York City, however, grows tighter every year. Staying true to the program’s mission was financially unsustainable, so the Project decided to serve whole foods to “the greatest extent possible.”

As Bonner says, this decision comes with a cost. “It allowed us to exceed and achieve our bottom-line goals. But you have to look at the cost. We have to pay upfront [for this work] now, or the community pays later. This is not just about achieving numbers for foundations, it’s about sustaining what we have created.”

Currently, the S.O.U.L. Food Project is looking for and reaching out to new funders to help FoodChange sustain the program and improve the health of New York City’s poorest residents. Until then, balancing the books and providing healthy, local food remains a challenge.

To learn more about the S.O.U.L. Food Project, contact Hiram Bonner at hbonner@foodchange.org.

Check out FoodChange's recipes for
Brown Rice & Tomato Salad and Baked Apple!