Today's food rescue: a bunch of submarine sandwiches from a local cafe!

Stuck em in the free fridge.

#solarPunk #mutualAid #foodRescue #foodSecurity #postScarcity #freeFridge

Massive Update on the Food Rescue front!!!

We worked out the contract issues with Food Rescue US (FRUS - foodrescue.us)and we just signed the contract!

We can now begin the rescue efforts in earnest!!!

This is MASSIVE!!!

This initiative started last November,, and while it's had a couple of obstacles, five months from conception to group formation to joining with a national org isn't that long.

We're also going to be joining Food Rescue Alliance (FRA - boulderfoodrescue.org/food-res…). They're a US based national "mutual aid of mutual aids" sort of thing. So we can join other food rescue groups and learn from each other.

I'd like to see if there's a state group to join as well. If not, I'd like to start one up. A lot of laws and regulations are state based and learning from other groups in our state would be amazing.

Soooo!!!!

Expect some more updates in the coming weeks.

I'm so excited!!!!

#solarPunk #mutualAid #foodRescue #postScarcity #foodSecurity

Home | Food Rescue US

Food Rescue US engages volunteers to transfer fresh food surpluses from local businesses to social service agencies serving the food insecure

^{Robbyn Footlick (Food Rescue US)}

Really cool update!

So we had our first win on finding a place that was interested in food rescue... the donut place (see above thread), right?

Right now, I've just been taking them to the Free Fridge each night.

Two things, one someone else has stepped up and is interested in helping glean - grabbing the food at the bakery and then dropping it off at the distribution point.

That's awesome.

Next... and this is amazing... I reached out to a local church that serves breakfast once a week. Asked them if they were interested in getting free fresh donuts for that. They said they were! So once a week, the night before breakfast, IF... we have donuts available, we drop them off at that church instead of the fridge.

Oh... and they're interested in putting a fridge outside of their church as well! Still gotta talk to their leadership and see what all we have to do, but it's a solid lead!!!

Just a little at time... and it keeps growing.

#foodRescue #freeFridge #solarPunk #mutualAid

Ok, been a bit since I gave a Food Rescue Program update.

We're still in onboarding for Food Rescue US. I pushed back on some of the contract language and we're sorting it out. Nothing major and they're awesome, it just takes some time.

In the mean time, I've spun up a web site, a discord chat, and a monthly meeting at the library!

We held our first in person meeting and it was a major success! We're pushing Food Rescue initiatives as well as expanding our Free Fridge program!

Folks had amazing ideas and have already started running down those leads.

I told them I'm not the leader. I'll facilitate and help guide and help remove obstacles and provide ideas but I can't do it all and they shouldn't wait on me to approve anything.

Ideas are put up to the group to discuss and shy of any major ethical concerns, usually folks gather up others and go and get it done.

This is going really well.

#solarPunk #foodRescue #mutualAid

Great News!!!

We got approved to work with foodrescue.us !!!

This gives us access to their coordination software and web app for free!

We can use the app to sign up food contributors & food distributors. Then volunteers can sign up to pick up from one and drop off to the other (basically logistics).

We can also operate under their aegis which gives us local credibility and also allows us to use their 501c3 non-profit status. So anyone donating to us can use it as a tax writeoff. They also provide our donors/contributors with quarterly and yearly statements for tax purposes. There's some other offerings, but thats the chunk!

A food rescue group from DC has already reached out to us to offer support and guidance!

It'll take around a week to get onboarded and then we'll start using it to scale out.

#foodRescue #foodSecurity #mutualAid #solarPunk

While waiting for the paperwork to go through for that national food rescue org, I'm still going to do food rescue manually.

Another donut haul! I dont know how many donuts. Lost count.

Anyhow. had to find space in the free fridge for it. Folks had added even more fresh veggies and bread and salads, so I had to get creative making room for my deserts. 😅

Edit: Ignore the lighting in the fridge. It was night time and I used a flash. Makes things weird colors. Anyhoo.

#freeFridge #foodRescue #mutualAid #solarPunk #postScarcity #foodSecurity

Ok! Had a technical demo of the web app for food rescue.

I think we're going to go with them.

Solid desktop app that scales well for mobile.

Its a lightweight org with a small budget but they're doing a lot with it. Feature rich currently and does everything i need it to do so far as coordinating between the food rescue sites, the food distribution sites, and the gleaners connecting the two.

Once we get it up and running officially, i'll post it here.

#foodRescue #foodSecurity #mutualAid #solarPunk #postScarcity

Update on my Food Rescue Initiative for my local town!!!

Two Things.

One, I've been getting hooked up with the local mutual aid crowd in my town and met some wonderful people recently!!! One of them is an organizer and is very very interested in creating more Free Fridges throughout town annnnnnd is very interested in setting up a Food Rescue program!

So her and I have been teaming up to get it done.

Two, we just had a meeting with a national (United States) group that has their own web app for coordinating between food contributors (the places that create the food and would otherwise throw out the good food that wasn't sold), food distributors, and the gleaners / volunteers who connect the two... basically logistics.

It was a good meeting and we may start to work under their aegis.

We're doing a technical demo of the web app this week hopefully.

If we decide to go with them, I'll put the update here.

I'm excited!!!

#solarPunk #foodRescue #foodSecurity

Someone dropped off a massive food rescue haul to our free fridge and community pantry today.

They're not part of my program and we're not sure who's doing it. This is awesome. It means there are others outside of our volunteer group that does maintenance on the fridges and outside of the group that I'm working with to build out our formal food rescue program.

This is huge.

This means we have successfully built post-scarcity *infrastructure*!!!

Folks are using our fridges both to contribute and to utilize. Folks that have nothing to do directly with the core group of maintainers. Wow.

We need to build more free fridges. This one is running out of room.

#freeFridge #foodSecurity #postScarcity #mutualAid #solarPunk #foodRescue