Long Island Cares receives $25,000 grant

Long Island Cares, the food bank responsible that supplies millions of pounds of food each year to Long Islanders in need, and whose busiest food pantry has operated in Freeport since 2010, has received a $25,000 grant from the Long Island Community Foundation.

This financial boost comes as the organization continues its efforts to combat hunger and food insecurity in Freeport and across Long Island. The Long Island Community Foundation, based in Melville, is a grantmaking foundation that brings together “individuals, families, foundations, and business to build a better community, and support nonprofits… in an effort to ensure meaningful opportunities and a better quality of life for all Long Islanders,” according to the foundation’s website.

Jessica Rosati, vice president for programs and community services at Long Island Cares, who played a key role in securing the grant, shared her perspective on the organization’s initiatives and the central role the grant will play in assisting the Center for Collaborative Assistance in Freeport.

“This foundation has been very supportive to Long Island Cares,” Rosati said, “and support like that — having donors and foundations that believe in what you do and trust us to do right by the people that we serve — really makes a huge difference in our ability to fulfill our mission. We’re just incredibly grateful that they’ve trusted us to be a recipient of this grant, and to really help us help the Freeport community.”

Long Island Cares served nearly 69,000 people in 2023, a remarkable 34 increase over 2022. It provided nearly 587,000 meals, an increase of 27 percent over 2022.

“The numbers really tell a very detailed story,” Rosati said, “about what the need really is here on Long Island, and that a lot of people are relying on the emergency food network to help sustain their basic food needs.”

Rosati added that the food the pantry purchases not only fulfills the nutritional need of needy residents, but also offers them a wide range of choices.

“And that’s really beautiful to see,” she said, “that people trust us, and they come to us … and when they come to get food, they get to select the items that they want, based on nutritional guidelines. And that’s wonderful, because they have more dignity and choice.”

The grant demonstrates the Long Island Community Foundation’s belief in Long Island Cares’ ability to make a meaningful impact on the widening problem of hunger and food insecurity. “A certain portion of that money is to help support salary for a staff,” Rosati explained. “The second bigger piece is food. A lot of the money that we secure for our programs is earmarked (for) food. And that’s, you know, a big misconception of food banking. Most people, when they think of a food bank or food pantry or soup kitchen, they think it’s stale bread and, you know, expired donated food. And that’s truly not the case. The majority of the food that a food bank distributes is purchased.”

Asked about the increasing need for food, Rosati confirmed that it is an issue across Long Island. “And Freeport demonstrates that for us,” she said, referring to the Long Island Cares food pantry. “Freeport gets three food deliveries in a five-day workweek in order to keep the shelves adequately stocked to serve that increased need. I’m appreciative that we have donors like the Long Island Community Foundation that trust us, so we can purchase more food to meet that increased need.”