Winter 2022 Newsletter

Friends and supporters of Sunrise Christian Food Ministry, Happy New Year! It has been too long and much has changed since our last update in Spring 2019. Not only has our world, as we knew it, changed forever, so has nearly every aspect of how we provide support and food to our community.

When Sacramento County went into shelter in place in March 2020, so did the over 200 Sacramento Food Bank partner agencies. It didn’t take long for the Sunrise Christian Food Ministry to be identified as an essential agency, along with 25 other food distribution agencies.

We took our new title and mission and pivoted to a distribution model that would not only provide food to the community but it also put the safety of our clients and volunteers as our number one priority. Our new drive thru distribution made it possible for us to serve more families than we ever knew was possible.

From March 2020- December 2021 the Sunrise Christian Food Ministry has provided food to 7,947 households consisting of 24,891 family members. These 7,947 clients have received over 42,500 food distributions, which breaks down to 145,000 moms, dads, babies, grandparents, veterans, and homeless,who for the last two years, with the help of our food closet, have not had to worry about how they would put food on the table and in their children’s bellies. It is also important to note that 5,233 of these households were new and had never visited a Sacramento Food Bank partner agency or the Sunrise Christian Food Ministry, prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Another heartwarming statistic we can pull out of these numbers is the 4,200 holiday distributions that consisted of Thanksgiving food boxes, including a turkey, and gift certificates that could be spent on groceries. These holiday distributions, which were provided in addition to our regular distributions, were lovingly packed and handed out in the hopes of helping to make the season brighter and get our families closer to the way things used to be.

None of this remarkable work could have been possible without the help of the hundreds of volunteers that selflessly gave of their time and talent to make sure hungry families had a place to get fed. In 2021 alone our volunteers logged an average of 16 hours a month and in many instances, they gave well over 40 hours each month to our ministry. To show our appreciation of the many volunteers, in October we were grateful to finally be able to gather as a group to share a meal at our annual volunteer luncheon and give thanks.

In addition to our individual accomplishments, over the last year, equally impressive is the 24 million pounds of food that the 26 core agencies were able to recover and distribute to the Sacramento Region. As we look to the future this number is a fraction of the food recovery the Sacramento Food Bank will distribute and divert from landfills, with our help, when SB 1383 goes into effect in 2022.

Preparing for an increase in donations was on the forefront of our mind when the food closet saved for and completed two major capital improvements this last year. Our first was the addition of an outdoor storage area with metal covering. The construction for this project was completed in June 2021. The timing couldn't have been better as we saw an increase in donations and need heading into the summer. The second improvement and most noticeable is our bright blue brand new donation box truck that was purchased in August 2021. Just about every day of the week you will see volunteers driving this beautiful truck around town to pick donations to bring back to the food closet for distribution.These improvements have added us greatly and will continue to prove a wise investment as we move into the New Year that promises to bring many wonderful changes including our new distribution hours (Monday-Friday, 11am-2pm).

While we are speaking about wonderful things, a New Year that wouldn’t be possible without the support of cherished friends like you, the love of our community and the help from our growing team of volunteers that give the Sunrise Christian Food Ministry it’s heartbeat and the ability to carry out the mission to do what God has put on our hearts to do and be grateful for how He has provided us with His abundance to serve those in need.

Please share this good news with all those you hold dear. Let them know that there is room for all to support our ministry. All those wishing to learn more about volunteering or making a donation can visit us online at www.sunrisechristianfoodministry.org or by scanning the QR code below.

I would also like to remind you about our Amazon Smile program. By selecting the Sunrise Christian Food Ministry as your charity of choice, we will receive a percentage of each purchase made through the Amazon Smile website and app. Please visit smile.amazon.com and search for us or use the QR code below to find and select us.

Thank you from the bottom of our hearts and we look forward to seeing what is yet to come.

Photo by Mark Filanov