Target stores and Zindagi Games have stepped up to help FOOD Share, Ventura County’s only regional food bank, collect much-needed food and funding at the end of 2011, the organization reported this week in a media release.
Through Dec. 31, seven Ventura County Target stores will position yellow FOOD Share collection barrels at their entrances in Ventura, Oxnard, Camarillo, Thousand Oaks, Moorpark and Simi Valley and encourage shoppers to fill them with non-perishable food donations for the hungry.
Zindagi Games, a Camarillo-based video gaming company, is benefiting three local charities — FOOD Share, Boys & Girls Club of Camarillo and RAIN Transitional Living Center — by inviting their participation in the 2011 $100,000 Zindagi Challenge. Zindagi principals, Umrao Mayer and George Simmons, have agreed to match dollar for dollar, up to a total of $50,000, raised by the three Ventura County nonprofits before Dec. 31. Zindagi is also challenging other Ventura County businesses to join in the effort by asking their employees to “give where they live.”
Zindagi Challenge monetary donations will be accepted through the Ventura County Community Foundation (VCCF) website: vccf.org/zindagi
During their 2011 Tackle Hunger donation drive, sponsored by Farmers Insurance, FOOD Share hopes to collect over $150,000 and more than 200,000 lbs of donated food before January 10, 2012. For a complete list of FOOD Share donation drop off locations, including select Farmers Insurance agent offices, go to www.foodshare.com
About FOOD Share:
The food bank distributing millions of pounds of food each year to those in need throughout Ventura County, FOOD Share collects and receives food year-round, distributing through more than 150 pantry partner agencies throughout Ventura County, including Camarillo, Fillmore, Moorpark, Oak View, Ojai, Oxnard, Santa Paula, Simi Valley, Somis, Thousand Oaks, and Ventura.
FOOD Share provides food to more than 74,500 people each month countywide through its partner agencies and multiple programs. Programs include the Senior Brown Bag that provides supplemental nutrition to nearly 2,000 low income seniors, home delivered meals and supplemental groceries through the Oxnard and Ventura Senior Nutrition Programs and, the Kids’ Farmers’ Markets, offering nutrition education, healthy recipe preparation and taste testing and a farmers’ market free fresh produce “shopping experience.”
In 2011, FOOD Share partnered with Ventura County’s Human Services Agency to provide expanded CalFresh enrollment assistance. CalFresh, formerly called food stamps, is the largest federal nutrition assistance program that provides supplemental nutrition assistance to eligible Ventura County residents.
For more information: call 805.983.7100 or go to http://www.foodshare.com