In October 2016, Seniors Personal Assistance Corporation (SPAC) set out to help low-income seniors suffering from food poverty. We saw the need for the assistance in many forms, however food is the one commodity seniors seem to budget for the least.
SPAC partnered with Arizona Department of Economic Security (DES) as Community Assistors to help people with the application process for medical and nutrition assistance programs. These types of programs help with the cost of premiums, co-pays and prescriptions, as well as provide money allocated for food purchases.
In addition, we've partnered with St. Mary's Food Bank as a distributor for their Commodity Senior Food Program. Once a month we recieve a shipment of 30lb food boxes for those who qualify. On a case by case basis, we deliver food boxes, using our personal vehicles, to those who have no transportation or are too sick to come in on thier own.
Over the last 2 years we have helped over 200 individuals and families apply for and receive SNAP and medical benefits. Our first month with St. Mary's we signed up 17 people. Now 8 months later, we have over 60 clients receiving food boxes.
Our goal for 2019 is to relieve the amount of people going to bed hungry every day. We hope that with new outreach opportunities and by achieving new partnerships, we can open a food pantry in order to better serve our current clients, as well as the community.
We currently sublease office space. With funding we hope to move forward with creating the space, shelving, and refrigeration for a food pantry with a future goal of moving into our own office space. Moving into a separate building will allow for more food box storage increasing distribution, as well as a bigger pantry. We will also be able to accommodate more people coming in for DES assistance by providing more computers allowing them to do their applicaitons with our assistance.
Your generous support will allow SPAC to reach more low-income seniors and families and help toward ending hunger within our community. We appreciate your taking into consideration our cause.
