By George Mower, Greater Vail Community Resources Board of Directors
This article provides a brief introduction to the Vail Food Bank and Thrift Store located between the tracks on Colossal Cave Road in Vail. We invite you to stop in and see for yourselves!
Greater Vail Community Resources (“ReSources”) began as a grassroots response to the need for a local food bank, but it couldn’t have started without the vision and hard work of many local leaders. When the ‘land between the tracks’ on Colossal Cave Road was acquired by the Vail School District in 2016, then superintendent, Calvin Baker, convened a group of Vail stakeholders to deliberate its best use. As a result, what had been a feed store became the Vail Thrift Store, and a modular building toward the rear of the property became Vail Food Bank.
The concept was simple: operate a thrift store and combine its proceeds with food and monetary donations to support the work of the food bank in a self-sustaining model. The most important ingredient was (and still is) the dedicated work of volunteers (representing over 12,000 service hours in 2021). The service area is roughly the size of the Vail Unified School District.
Since its beginnings, ReSources Food Bank, a member of the Arizona Food Bank Network, has expanded its food bank programs and continues to be assisted in its mission by the Vail School District, corporate partners, local retailers, faith-based organizations, and caring individuals within the community. It has now been improving lives in our region for over five years.
Here are the results of the Food Bank programs to help feed in need residents of the greater Vail area in 2021.
2021 Results:
Annual food distributed: 220,800 lbs.
5,553 *TEFAP bags to 3,342 families and 12,851 individuals
Food Bank commodities to 1,438 families and 5256 individuals
Senior homebound visits and boxes distributed: 497
Weekend food ‘backpacks’ distributed to students: 3,000
*The Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP) is a federal program that helps supplement the diets of low-income Americans by providing them with emergency food assistance at no cost
Holiday Giving Highlights:
Thanksgiving: 156 families and 663 individuals served
Christmas: 116 families and 454 individuals served
Distributed toiletries, COVID test kits, socks, & more
We give thanks to our local community and ask your continued support of the Vail Thrift Store and Food Bank in 2022.
