There are seven members that make up the core group of Salvage Sorting Volunteers at the New Hampshire Food Bank: Eileen & George Denoncourt, Gail Sprague, Kathy Satter, Pat McGiffin, Paul Bartlett, and Phillip Moreau. This group is dedicated, reliable, does their work with precision, and all group members have amazing, can-do attitudes.

As the only food bank in the state, the NH Food Bank distributed over 14.2 million pounds of food in 2019 (the most recent statistic at the time when their award nomination was written), which would not have been possible without this amazing group of volunteers. Their main responsibility is salvage sorting, which consists of inspecting and organizing non-perishable food donations. The COVID-19 pandemic led to extremely restricted volunteer opportunities for a time, where only a limited number of volunteers were allowed in the salvage room at a time. This core group of 7 was responsible for ALL of the salvage sorting at that time.

The New Hampshire Food Bank Salvage Sorting Volunteers received the Outstanding Volunteer Service Award in the Group category at the 2020 Spirit of NH Awards. Watch their video here, and scroll down for an update.

The New Hampshire Food Bank Salvage Sorting Volunteers

An update from Ashley D. Moulton, Volunteer Coordinator

What has volunteerism looked like at the Food Bank in the past year?

We have more volunteer opportunities than ever and the shortage of volunteers is still an extreme struggle. The only volunteer opportunity I do not, and have not, ever had to worry about recruiting for is Salvage! Our crew is still plugging away every Monday-Thursday from 8-11 AM.

Have pandemic restrictions continued to limit the number of volunteers and/or the tasks they can do?

Yes, we currently still have a limitation on the number of volunteers we can have for each volunteer opportunity. Volunteering at the Annual AG Food Show (today – September 15, 2021) has also been cancelled due to the rise in cases and the number of vendors and participants that are attending.

Has the core group of 7 Salvage Sorting Volunteers continued to be consistent?

Yes, thank goodness! We have a limit of 12 now for salvage. The team has grown to about 20 regulars that rotate days they come in. Typically, out of the 20, we have about 7-10 volunteers for salvage M-TH. They stay well ahead of our loads. The core group of 7 took the new volunteers under their wings, fully trained each of them, passed on their extensive knowledge of the process, and threw in a few “tricks of the trade”!

More information about the New Hampshire Food Bank can be found at: https://nhfoodbank.org/

September is Hunger Action Month. Learn more here: https://nhfoodbank.org/ham/