STEAC STORIES
Commentary: STEAC fighting food insecurity in Davis during the COVID-19 crisis
Special to The Enterprise
April 18, 2020
By Wayne Eckert Special to The Enterprise
The Short Term Emergency Aid Committee was founded more than 50 years ago to meet the basic needs of low-income families and individuals in the community during times of crisis. The current COVID-19 crisis, while difficult for everyone, will have the most serious effects on those whose low incomes make them more vulnerable to food insecurity, homelessness and other forms of financial instability.
Families in our community are struggling right now due to job loss, illness, lack of health care and many other effects of long-standing inequities made worse by the current health crisis. STEAC is committed to providing support to low-income families now and into the future as the effects of this crisis continue to impact the lives of those in need.
STEAC has a dedicated group of staff and volunteers that have been working hard over the last month to modify STEAC’s programs in order to keep both volunteers and clients healthy while continuing to provide services that are so desperately needed.
Right now, food insecurity is the issue that is most pressing. With rising unemployment, more and more families are finding it difficult to provide enough food to feed their families. STEAC’s food programs are helping to fill the gap.
Volunteers, including many UC Davis Ph.D. students like Jess Rudder and Derek Rury, pack grocery bags with shelf-stable items like canned goods, pasta, rice and oil, as well as high-need items like fresh dairy, meat and eggs. STEAC provides up to five days of groceries for each person in the family for up to 45 Davis families each week.
Although school is no longer taking place inside the usual school buildings, STEAC continues to partner with DJUSD to provide Food Packs for Kids to help families feed their children with bags of food for the weekends. Every week during this crisis, the Cooke family (Janis, Alex, Stuart and Joel) have volunteered together to fill 100 bags with meal and snack items for Davis school children to take with them for the weekends when they pick up the free lunches and breakfasts at Montgomery Elementary School in Davis.
STEAC faces challenges in our efforts to continue providing nutritious food to those in need. STEAC regularly purchases perishable items from local stores including Trader Joe’s, Food 4 Less, the Davis Food Co-op and Grocery Outlet. These commercial partners have been incredibly accommodating, assisting STEAC volunteers in making our food orders and even wheeling the groceries to vehicles.
However, the demand for food from consumers as well as disruptions in supply chains are leading to increased prices and decreasing availability of food. Additionally, STEAC relies on community food donations to provide more than 2,000 pounds of food we distribute every week. Due to the shelter in place restrictions, STEAC has had to cancel two major community food drives resulting in the loss of close to 20,000 pounds of food we would normally collect.
To meet these challenges, STEAC needs your help. We have instituted a social distancing compliant food donation drop-off from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. every Tuesday at the STEAC Food Closet at 642 Hawthorn Lane, in the parking lot behind St. Martin’s Episcopal Church. Cash donations can also be made at www.steac.org or mailed to 1712 Picasso Ave., Suite D, Davis, CA 95618.
We are so appreciative of the many STEAC supporters who have donated food and money since this crisis began to help us continue to meet these and other basic needs including eviction prevention, utility and first month’s rent support and job interview clothing. We could not do our work without our generous community and we are sincerely grateful.
— Wayne Eckert is the president of the STEAC board of directors.