Access Community Action Agency adding food truck

WILLIMANTIC — Thanks to a $141,000 grant from Connecticut FoodShare, Access Community Action Agency will be purchasing a food truck to deliver more food to low-income residents in the area.

“We are extremely grateful and excited to receive this award and the truck should arrive sometime this fall,” Access Specialist of Fund Development Sherry Perkins said in a press release.

The Community Impact Grant was awarded as part of Connecticut Foodshare’s $1.4 million investment in partner food pantries and meal programs across Connecticut.

Connecticut Foodshare distributed grants to 53 organizations through the Community Impact Grant program this round. Access Community Action Agency Senior Director of Community Engagement and Resource Management Kathleen Krider said Access expects to receive the truck, which will come from Canada, in September.

She said with a refrigerated truck, the food capacity will triple, noting that currently, staff load food into coolers.

“We really hope to be a part of the greater food security conversation in the Windham region,” Krider said.

Access serves 28 towns in the Windham and Tolland counties.

Krider said the mobile food pantry currently visits 15 or so neighborhoods and communities at least once a month.

“Our truck is on the road everyday, five days-aweek,” she said.

Krider said the new truck will deliver to all of the same neighborhoods and communities that Access staff currently deliver to.

Access partnered with “The Farmer’s Truck,” an organization that designs mobile market food trucks, to get the food truck.

“We’ve been in conversations with “The Farmers Truck” for a while so they’ve been very helpful,” Krider said.

In addition to the mobile food pantry, there are also on-site emergency food pantries in the Danielson office at 231 Broad Street and in the Willimantic office at 1315 Main St.

The Willimantic pantry is open Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from 8 a.m. to

4 p.m. and the Danielson pantry is open Tuesdays and Thursdays from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Food is distributed at the two on-site pantries by appointment every month.

Access will be participating in Connecticut FoodShare’s Annual Walk for Hunger on May 20 at Dunkin Donuts Park in Hartford for the first time this year.

All funds raised by Access will benefit their site-based and mobile food pantries.

Access’s goal is to raise $3,000 to purchase and provide meals to more than 4,000 families this year. Access is accepting donations for the walk through Connecticut Foodshare’s online platform at bit. ly/3nx6aMF. Information about joining the team is also available at that link. The event is free. No minimum donation is required to participate in the event.

Registration on event day begins at 8 a.m. and the 1.5 mile walk begins at 10 a.m.

Those who can not participate the day of the event can support it by donating online and participating virtually by walking your own 1.5 mile route.

For more information about the event, contact Perkins at 860-450-7400 ext. 7459 or e-mail her at sherry.perkins@accessagency.org.

The mobile food pantry’s schedule is on the Access website at https:// bit.ly/3zuZOzS.

To make an appointment for the on-site pantry in Willimantic, call 860-4507400 ext. 7495

Follow Michelle Warren on Twitter –@mwarrentc.