"Our mission is to assist people who are hungry in the City of Lynnwood and South Snohomish County by providing a highly efficient food distribution center.
The Lynnwood Food Bank is a private nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization that collects and distributes more than 870,000 pounds of food each year to low-income children, adults and seniors. The Food Bank currently serves an average of 1062 households (avg. 3,990 individuals) each month.
For a copy of our financial statement, IRS Form 990, which includes larger grants for the new building and truck, please download from the "Links" page, e-mail us using the "Contact Us" page, or call us at 425-745-1635.
Communities Continue to Help
Our Lynnwood and Greater Seattle communities continue to help their neighbors in need through us with both business and individual donations.
Recently the Hazel Miller Foundation of Edmonds honored us with a grant to help purchase more food during the Holiday Season. We greatly appreciate their generosity. They have also made donations to numerous other area charitable organizations.
Their grant to Rotary First Harvest also helps get more produce to Lynnwood and other local food banks. To read more go to this Edmonds Beacon article.
We are also pleased to announce the significant cash donation by The Odyssey Seafood Company of Seattle. They have also blessed us indirectly with donations to Northwest Harvest and have shared with a number of other charities. Please go here. This will allow us to continue to be generous to our clients for a number of months.
Thanks to all who have shared Food and Money with your neighbors who aren't as fortunate.
For the past year, the Lynnwood Food Bank has partnered with the Medical Teams International Mobile Dental van by hosting free dental clinics with insignificant cost to us. Jane Tocco who is a retired dental clinic manager and Board member of LFB stepped up to manage this program, including arranging for volunteer dentists and hygienist, making appointments and reminding patients. The patients pay a small co-pay, Medical Teams International funds half of each clinic day and the Salvation Army matches the co-pays so the entire visit is covered for each client. They have seen an average of 18 patients at each monthly clinic and have helped our client's health and nutrition and relieved chronic pain for these folks who can't afford dental care.
Mobile dental van brings vital service to Lynnwood Food Bank
By Cathy Herholdt
Published: Monday, November 2, 2009
Volunteer dentists provide vital care to low income patients at various locations, such as the Lynnwood Food Bank, thanks to a mobile dental van. |
Clients at the Lynnwood Food Bank have access to much-needed dental care without having to travel to another location. A mobile dental van from Medical Teams International, a Northwest-based charity that provides medical and dental care to impoverished communities around the world, will be on site at the food bank once a month for the next few months.
Approximately 16 people were treated during the dental van’s first visit to the food bank in September, according to food bank volunteer and board member Jane Tocco, who schedules appointments. Between 250 and 300 people use the food bank each week, and with the van coming just once a month, “We really try to see people who are in pain, or have a tooth that has been bothering them for a year or so, but they haven’t had the money to get it fixed,” said Tocco, who has managed several local dental practices. “We did everything from pulling teeth to treating abscesses,” she said. There was also a hygienist that day so some patients were able to have their teeth cleaned for the first time in years. “They were so overwhelmingly grateful for it,” said Tocco.
Patients can call the food bank on Wednesday mornings between 9 a.m. and noon to schedule an appointment for the next dental van visit. There is a $20 co-pay to help cover the cost of bringing the van to the food bank, but if someone cannot pay, as was the case with one homeless man Tocco scheduled, they are still seen. All of the doctors and dentists with Medical Teams International are volunteers.
Long time food bank volunteer and retired physician Ken Peirce has served with Medical Teams International, volunteering in places like El Salvador and Armenia. He believes having access to dental care is a vital part of a healthy community. “I think it’s a great idea,” he said of the two agencies teaming up.
Tocco agrees and believes the food bank is the perfect place to provide such a vital service to people in need. “I think it’s so important that we take care of people in other ways than just feeding them,” she said.
