The recent $20,000 donation represents ongoing, generous support from a true friend of the Food Bank and will provide up to 80,000 meals for low-income individuals and families throughout Los Angeles County.
The gift was announced at Feed SoCal in Gardena on June 14, 2019. “Our purpose as a firm is to make people’s financial lives better and one thing we realized is that you can’t do that when people are hungry*,” said Brad Chambers, Senior Vice President and Market Manager at Bank of America and Los Angeles Regional Food Bank Board Member. “With 1.4 million folks that have food insecurity in the city, we’ve made it one of our top philanthropic commitments to give both in terms of man-hours as well as more than $600,000 over the years.”
Bank of America is also generous with their time and energy. They regularly volunteer at the Los Angeles Regional Food Bank. Volunteering is critical to the Food Bank. In 2018, more than 37,000 people gave their time sorting, gleaning and packing food. Many of these are large corporate groups that take time out of their busy week not only for team building but also to make an impact in the communities where they live and work.
By supporting the Food Bank, Bank of America has also played a role in preventing potential waste and mobilizing resources to efficiently address basic need in LA County. “It goes back to some of the core values you learn as a kid,” says Chambers. “As an abundant society, where so much is generated in this country, it is greatly satisfying really to see that resources that could potentially go to waste are used to help people who don’t have access to those resources.”
Because of their contributions over the years, Bank of America was honored with the Partners Making A Difference Award by the Food Bank in 2016.
If you’ve never joined us for a volunteer activity, please consider coming to see this community-driven work for yourself. Volunteer groups help us six days a week to ensure that nutritious food gets to those who need it most.
*The number of food-insecure people in LA County is now reported to be 2 million, as of July 2019.