As folks set goals to kick off the new year, here at Food Bank of the Rockies we’re also excited to share some of our 2025 aspirations. Across our programs and departments, our staff is hard at work brainstorming ways to more efficiently and effectively support our communities with the food necessary to thrive. Join us in looking ahead to the new year with hope and anticipation, knowing that, thanks to your support, Food Bank of the Rockies will be able to nourish our neighbors experiencing hunger.
Programs Department
All Teams
We are excited to roll out a tool to ensure we are equitably getting the right programs into the right communities throughout our service area. This will include developing a food equity plan to ensure we are meeting all neighbors’ needs in relation to foods offered, geographic reach, and people served.
Additionally, the Programs Team is excited to launch the Department of Food Systems and Community Building in 2025! Through this model, we will have a more consistent presence in all of our communities by working more closely with our Hunger Relief Partners. We will do this by understanding who our partners serve, getting the right foods to them, and supporting their interests to advance how they best serve neighbors’ immediate and longer-term needs in a dignified and culturally responsive manner.
Data and Insights
We will create a partner data system that can be used by our teams to better meet neighbors’ needs by identifying geographic, demographic, and logistical gaps faced by our partners.
Nutrition
The Nutrition Team will be training at least 10 Hunger Relief Partners on the Healthy Eating Research (HER) Nutrition Guidelines to help them identify the nutritional benefits of foods using expert recommendations and facts. Additionally, we will be integrating HER guidelines into all Culturally Responsive Food Initiative items, as informed by neighbor feedback. Better quality of food available promotes more nutritious choices, and we are dedicated to ensuring the highest quality of food for our partners and neighbors.
Food for Health
Since the Food for Health Program launched in the fall of 2022, we have supported more than 500 patients facing food insecurity and chronic diseases with medically tailored food that supports their well-being. This year, we aim to add an additional 5-10 medical clinic partners to our 8 current partners and grow the number of Food for Health Program participants by 50%, ultimately serving more than 360 patients in 2025.
Feedback from Food for Health participants so far includes the following:
- 94% of participants shared that the program has impacted their understanding of how nutrition affects their own health
- 95% of participants reported that the program helped them maintain or lower their blood pressure
- 79% of participants reported maintaining or lowering their blood sugar levels
Everyday Eats
Everyday Eats supports income-qualifying adults ages 60 and older with monthly boxes of nourishing food. In 2025, we will continue to grow available funding to provide supplemental items requested by our neighbors, including fresh produce. We will also form new partnerships with partners in rural areas, expand service to Clear Creek County, and enhance the ways we support current partners of Everyday Eats.
SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program)
We will continue to focus on decreasing the need for food assistance in our community by helping neighbors complete applications for SNAP. We will do this through our SNAP Outreach Representatives, who will provide application assistance to over 800 neighbors in 2025! Additionally, our representatives will focus on expanding SNAP services on college campuses to support students struggling to both nourish themselves and advance their education.
Food for Kids
To best serve the children in our community, the Food for Kids Team will focus on recruiting additional partners in rural areas for the Summer Food Service Program, providing nourishing meals to school-aged children during the summer and expanding our reach by 10% or more. We aim to continue creating practices that allow for further growth and development in our Food for Kids programs, including more scratch-made, whole foods and reaching more kids.
Operations Department
Sourcing Team
In 2025, we are excited to launch the Community Choice Produce Program, which aims to increase access to a wider variety of fresh produce for neighbors. This program comes out of feedback heard from partners and contributes to Food Bank of the Rockies’ goals to provide fresh, nutritious, culturally responsive, and familiar food items to our neighbors.
We will also continue to increase access to high-quality produce and Colorado-grown goods. Through grants, we will be able to provide items such as locally sourced produce, Colorado beef, Colorado pork, and Colorado chicken to our partners — and ultimately our neighbors — at no cost!
Food Rescue Team
The Food Rescue Team is diligently working to uncover new sources of donated food and ramping up our efforts to find and cultivate new partnerships. The more Food Rescue partners we have, the more high-quality food we can put into the hands of our neighbors.
FRESH Program Team
We are working to significantly expand fresh produce distribution to more rural communities, develop additional neighbor-centric food preference lists, and grow the Western Slope Dehydrator Program to increase the production of dried fruit snacks for our Totes of Hope® Program.
Western Slope
Food for Health Program
We will continue bringing on new partners to deliver weekly boxes of medically tailored food to neighbors experiencing food insecurity and chronic diseases.
SNAP
We are dedicated to reaching more older adults and first-generation college students across the Western Slope in need of food by helping them enroll in SNAP.
Outreach
Through a grant partnership with Alterra Mountain Community Foundation, Food Bank of the Rockies aims to highlight the economic impact seasonal employees make in resort and mountain communities as well as the challenges they face due to high cost of living and a lack of affordable housing options. We aim to meet each of those people where they are and provide them with the food they need to thrive, so that they can continue to help our communities thrive.
