Jordi Gassó Photo
Johannes (left) with fellow agency heads Dyer (second from left), and O’Sullivan (right).
Two years ago, David O’Sullivan went to O’Tooles Irish Pub for a pint and a bite. He picked up an Irish newspaper, and read about the Great Irish Famine of the 19th century.
A light bulb went off in his head. O’Sullivan, coordinator of the Community Soup Kitchen since 1987, decided to set up an annual fundraiser in honor of An Gorta Mór — The Great Hunger — to assist his organization and combat hunger today in New Haven.
In its third iteration, with a final event hosted at O’Tooles this past Thursday, the fundraiser now benefits two additional food assistance not-for-profits: FISH of Greater New Haven and Loaves & Fishes Food Pantry. The event allowed attendees to enjoy drinks, buffet food, live music and a chance to win some prizes through raffles and silent auctions.
More importantly, the fundraiser aimed to increase awareness about hunger and food shortages in New Haven, and the institutions that work toward alleviating these afflictions. More and more people, from a wider range of backgrounds, are showing up at the agencies’ doors looking for food.
“Connecticut is one of the wealthiest states in the country, but there’s still a big dichotomy between the wealthy and the poor,” O’Sullivan said. “It’s an issue, trying to convince people that there’s a hunger problem right in their own neighborhood.”
Signing up for one of the silent auctions.
Booze and prizes were means to that end on Thursday. A sign at the entrance encouraged patrons to donate a suggested $20 contribution. Bar booths became makeshift displays for sweaters, football tickets, jewelry and goody baskets full of gift certificates and bath products. The folkie sounds of Simon and Garfunkel, Bob Dylan and Johnny Cash, courtesy of the Alehounds, were the soundtrack to the evening.
The event also doubled as an opportunity for FISH to introduce its new executive director, Joy Johannes, to the community.
Johannes might be a recent transplant to New Haven but she is no stranger to the issue of hunger: she has previously held advisory roles for famine-relief efforts in Somalia and Kenya.
Her first day on the job was last Monday. She has hit the ground running, having already performed a couple of after-hours food deliveries in person to homes in need. FISH is the only agency in the area that distributes groceries directly to homebound individuals with limited or no transportation options.
Now, one of Johannes’s main goals as director is to formalize FISH’s intake process for these individuals. As of now, she said, there are no substantiated criteria in place. Currently, all information for new homes added to their delivery list is self-reported through a hotline.
“We’re looking at income, number of people living in the household, whether they’re handicapped or elderly,” she said. “The key word is ‘homebound.’”
FISH is the only agency in Greater New Haven to deliver free meals directly to homes.
Though FISH seeks to support a niche demographic — people with very little access to local food pantries — it has still been operating over capacity, said Steve Werlin, a board member. Establishing a set of criteria, he said, would help ease the burden of backlogs.
In 2013, FISH served approximately 350 homes monthly. Last month, that figure bumped up to 400, said board member Sue Redente.
“More people are calling in than we can serve,” Werlin told the Independent. “Sometimes we can’t get to them within 48 hours.”
O’Sullivan and Rev. Alex Dyer, executive director of Loaves & Fishes, aired their own supply-and-demand woes over drinks at the O’Tooles outdoor patio.
Dyer said Loaves & Fishes, a food pantry run by the Episcopal Church of St. Paul & St. James on Olive Street, had doled out the same quantities of groceries and products it served in all of 2013 by June of this year. Storage poses an additional restraint, plus, the pantry doesn’t count with a walk-in fridge.
“Our bank accounts are near empty. The pantry is the barest it’s been,” he said. “We’re working on a week-to-week basis.”
For an hour and a half every Saturday morning, during what Dyer called “beautifully orchestrated chaos,” Loaves & Fishes offers visitors one grocery bag of canned and fresh goods, and sets up a clothing closet, all free of charge. This year, he said, it’s been assisting between 250 and 350 families each week — up from its high of around 270 last year.
Community Soup Kitchen will likely see an extra 2,000 individuals walk through its doors by the end of this year, O’Sullivan said, raising its yearly number to 75,000 people served. Like Loaves & Fishes, the organization doesn’t have any kind of intake guidelines.
“This past month, we did 7,540 meals, but there’s still no sense of the need,” he said. In recent months, he has noticed an influx of new people coming into the soup kitchen from out of town.
Sipping on his well drink, O’Sullivan reflected on the not-so-good developments: some regular donors, many of whom tend to be older, have cut their donations in half. In better news for the soup kitchen: out of the blue, in June the Tariq Farid Foundation agreed to donate $1,000 a month for the next year.
The Alehounds brought the folk to O’Tooles on Thursday night.
These food assistance programs, each with decades of service under their belts, need all the help they can get, as the number of people resorting to them keeps increasing. Every donated dollar, it was advertised, could fund up to nine meals.
The demographics of hunger also seem to be shifting. More and more, Dyer said, the working poor — those who can’t pay all their bills — are the ones looking for support.
“It used to be the myth that only homeless people go to soup kitchens,” O’Sullivan said. “It’s no longer just an emergency. [Our organizations] are institutionalized, a part of the fabric of society.”
With a beer in front of him, Dyer chimed in as “Wagon Wheel” played in the background.
“It’s a permanent state of emergency,” he said. “Emergency is the new normal.”
At the end of the night, the raffle winners were announced to great fanfare. Hopeful participants looked at their tickets as the winning numbers were recited. Johannes herself picked up a dinner for two at Biagio’s Osteria in Stratford.
Patrons congregated near the exit, saying their goodbyes and checking to see who were the highest bidders for each auction. The Alehounds packed their instruments, and the familiar din of bar chatter took hold again.
I am mailing this article to Rosa DeLauro who is among the 50 richest members of Congress.
My issue is housing the homeless and part of this grim economic picture. The rich and the govt must address this problem. The biggest non-profit in town, Yale, has done little to help. During UW's 100 Day Homeless Challenge, Yale donated a measly 5 grand. I have written to each member of Yale's board asking how they feel about their corporation headquarters sitting in the middle of a ghetto with rising homelessness and crime. How does it look to students who are taught to care about their fellow men...