PEABODY — No Child Goes Hungry in Peabody has been named the Peabody Area Chamber of Commerce’s Nonprofit of the Month for August.
Located in the former location of the Conway Cahill-Brodeur Funeral Home & Cremation Care at 20 Church St., volunteers of the nonprofit pack bags of food for children across the city, No Child Goes Hungry in Peabody Vice President and Chief Operating Officer Jarrod Hochman said. Volunteers from around the area bag food on Wednesdays and Thursdays, with more volunteers driving to drop the food off on Thursdays.
The nonprofit was formed in October 2017 to feed 120 elementary-school students in the district, Hochman said. It began with volunteers dropping off backpacks filled with meals at the schools on Fridays, which were returned and filled again the following week.
When students were sent home due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the model shifted to a home-delivery service, he said. Now, the nonprofit services approximately 440 students across the district each week and provides them with one or two bags of meals and groceries.
“It’s remarkable how much the program’s evolved since then,” he said.
Hochman, who has been a School Committee member since 2009, said he estimates nearly 1,000 volunteers have contributed over the past seven years, none of whom were paid.
All of the food comes from donations, mostly from the Greater Boston Food Bank, he said. The nonprofit also gives away non-food items, including winter clothes and school supplies, that are donated to it.
“It’s just been a tremendous community effort,” Hochman said. “It’s remarkable to me how many people have touched this program.”
Peabody resident Ryan Morrison said he began volunteering as a driver nearly three years ago.
“I’ve actually talked to some of the people that I would see on the street… and they would ask me what I’m doing… They’d say, ‘How long are you gonna do this for?’ And I’d say, ‘Forever,’” Morrison said. “They’d say, ‘Why? I don’t understand.’ I’m like, ‘I have to keep Peabody alive.”
Alan Titelbaum, a member of the nonprofit’s board of directors, said he became involved with No Child Goes Hungry in Peabody during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“My Thursday, this is it,” he said. “(I) drop everything when I know I have to be here on a Thursday to do this.”
“This is about helping kids and families,” Hochman said.
