SWAMPSCOTT — The Housing Authority will be distributing free food items from Whole Foods to its residents every Tuesday.
Swampscott Housing Authority (SHA) was offered an opportunity to partner up with the local Whole Foods supermarket on Paradise Road and receive food donations for its residents on a weekly basis.
Irma Chez, executive director of the SHA, said that representatives of Whole Foods contacted the Housing Authority two weeks ago and offered this partnership. On Tuesday, SHA carried out the first pickup.
“We didn’t know what to expect. They promised us 150 to 200 pounds of food each week,” said Chez. “But what we have received today is beyond 200 pounds.”
Fruits, vegetables, breads, juice, cheese and other grocery items filled three vehicles.
When it was delivered to the community room of the SHA on Duncan Terrace, the food was organized on tables and in the small fridges that the Housing Authority has. The SHA told all of its residents to come by and get whatever they wanted in the afternoon.
The Swampscott Senior Tenants Association was helping with the distribution.
“We don’t have much space and big refrigerators,” Chez said. “But I said we will make it work.”
Moving forward, two assigned staff members of the SHA will be picking up food from the Whole Foods store every Tuesday and it will be distributed to the residents on a first-come-first-served basis the same day. There are 137 residents who call the SHA home.
“This is great food, so we are really happy,” said Chez.
Whole Foods works with Food Donation Connection, a company that manages its surplus food-donation program.
The food that gets donated is perfectly good food that meets all the safety guidelines, but would otherwise go to waste, said Daniel Gouge, a representative for Food Donation Connection.
The surplus of food occurs because some food items become non-sellable to the customers, for example, as they approach “best-by” date.
“So that’s the window of opportunity where the food is still safe and quality, but it is not going to be given to the customers of the store,” Gouge said.
Food Donation Connection finds nonprofit and charity organizations for its clients in its respective areas to partner up on a long-term basis and benefit the local community.
“We want to make sure they are optimizing and donating as much of the surplus food as they can,” said Gouge.
The recipients who were currently scheduled for donation pickups from the Paradise Road Whole Foods could not accommodate the food surplus in its entirety throughout the week, so the company was able to bring the SHA on board.
“It is all going to benefit the residents, especially the families,” Chez said.
