Community Food Assistance Program

The Bay Area Food Bank provides food for families and individuals through our Community Food Assistance Program (CFAP). The history of our Community Food Assistance Program speaks for itself in teamwork, efficiency and quality, as well as quantity. The program was started based on a call from Mobile County Commissioner Dean’s office when oystermen had been restricted from work for several weeks and organizations in the Coden and Bayou-La-Batre area of Alabama had expended all their pantry supplies. Within days of the phone call the Food Bank coordinated a load of unsorted donated food from the Atlanta Food Bank, Commissioner Dean and the Food Bank staff raised funds from local businesses to cover transportation and other expenses, Metro jail inmates and other community volunteers sorted the food for delivery to South Mobile Community Action at the Bayou-La-Batre Community Center and assisted with the unloading while distribution of over 20,000 pounds of food to 250 families was provided by the Girl Scouts. Using this first distribution, the Food Bank developed a process, dubbed the Community Food Assistance Program, which combines donated food, USDA commodities and bulk purchased food to create a variety of boxed or bagged food to assist families with breakfast, lunch and dinner items. With over 30 distributions during the past 2 ½ years, the process of collaboration is now well established.