Coffeehouse Food Share: We're ready
By Linda Lemmon
Town Crier Editor
The elephant in the room for this week’s Danielson Veterans Coffeehouse Food Share? The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is in limbo.
But Bruce Hay, longtime leader of the Food Share, is confident there will be food available.
“I have a feeling I’m gonna have a lot more people,” he said. This problem has never happened before so “it’s very hard to predict.”
The drive-through food distribution starts at 9:30 a.m. Nov. 6 at the farmer’s market pavilion off Kennedy Drive. He said when he arrives around 6 a.m. there are usually 10 or 11 cars already lined up in the parking lot. If he sees 20 or 30 cars lined up Thursday, he’ll know he’ll be using his exceptional organizing skills.
Hay sees what he will have to work with when the Connecticut Foodshare truck arrives early Thursday. A truck from Midwest Food Bank New England may not have as much food on board as usual because of its shortened holiday schedule next week. 
He already has 330 banana boxes set to start dividing food into. And throughout the distribution by dozens of volunteers, he reassesses: Looking at the line of cars and the food that’s available. He can “tweak” the boxes’ contents if need be.
In addition, he may be able to get frozen foods when he visits Midwest Nov. 5.
He estimates he should have 20,000 pounds of food available Thursday. 
The Food Share began during COVID in 2020 and has grown into a highly organized program that feeds more and more people the first Thursday of every month.

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