New HACAP mobile food pantry serving food deserts in Eastern Iowa

Food pantries are great — if you can get to them. But if you live too far away to walk, don't have a car or don't live on a bus line, you might be out of luck.

Enter the mobile food pantry.

The Hawkeye Area Community Action Program (HACAP) is unveiling this month a mobile food pantry the organization will use to deliver food to parts of seven Eastern Iowa counties that don't have easy access to food distribution centers. The large truck with refrigerator and freezer compartments was purchased with $77,000 donated by the Alliant Energy Foundation.

'It lets us go where the people are,' said Linda Gorkow, reservoir director. 'It can affect the food deserts everywhere.'

Food desert describes a low-income census tract where a substantial number or share of residents have low access to a grocery store. The U.S. Department of Agriculture has a map that lets users zoom in to any part of the country and see official food deserts, as well as other areas where residents may have trouble getting to a food pantry.

While pockets of Cedar Rapids and Iowa City are food deserts, whole swathes of rural Iowa counties meet the designation, according to the USDA.

HACAP's first mobile food pantry was May 21 in Iowa County, where 1,840 residents are food insecure and 695 children and elderly live in poverty, according to Feeding America. HACAP hosted another event Saturday in Vinton. Following the official unveiling of the truck July 18, it will go to Westdale Apartments in Cedar Rapids for a Mobile Market at noon.

HACAP provides a variety of anti-poverty programs, but is perhaps most well known for its food reservoir. The reservoir, in Hiawatha, distributed 4.4 million pounds of food to 102 partner agencies in fiscal 2015.

Alliant has provided grants to HACAP for its backpack program, which sends weekend food parcels home with low-income students, and hosts an annual Drive Out Hunger golf event.

When company leaders delivered the golf event check to HACAP last year, Linda Mattes, vice president of energy delivery operations, asked HACAP CEO Jane Drapeaux about the agency's needs.

'Jane mentioned they would really like to expand their Mobile Food Pantry program throughout the seven counties they serve, but to do this they would need a truck that is adequately equipped to haul refrigerated and frozen food in addition to the non-perishables,' Alliant said.

In addition to paying for the new truck, Alliant also provides employee volunteers to donate, pack and distribute food.

The Johnson County Board of Supervisors recently decided to partner with the Iowa City-based Crisis Center to provide a mobile food pantry to several mobile home parks.

Crisis Center officials identified three mobile home parks — Regency, Western Hills and Sunrise Village/Modern Manor — to receive monthly visits by the mobile food pantry. The Crisis Center would use an Elder Services van, normally used for Meals on Wheels delivery, for $5,000 for one year.

Johnson County allocated $30,000 to the project.

HACAP food distributions by county in the last year

Source: HACAP

County

Pounds

Benton

160.320

Cedar

97.572

Iowa

39.107

Johnson

1,669,218

Jones

101.546

Linn

2,570,717

Washington

123.706