Food Fight: Arkansas Hunger Relief Alliance’s Serving Up Solutions Aims to Take a Bite Out of Hunger

 

When Sharon and Carl Vogelpohl accepted the roles of chairing the 15th annual Serving Up Solutions fundraiser June 16 for the Arkansas Hunger Relief Alliance (AHRA), they knew one thing right off. This wasn’t just something Sharon, president of MHP/Team SI, and Carl, chief of staff to Lt. Gov Tim Griffin, would take on. Their kids, Carson, 13, and Jonathan, 10, were going to be right in the middle of supporting AHRA with them. 

 

“We’re not ‘smile and dial’ people,” Sharon explains. “I like the active part. That’s really a lot of what this initiative is about, including the kids. When Carl and I accepted the invitation to chair this, we thought, ‘What a great opportunity to be able to involve the whole family.’”

 

AHRA is a statewide alliance of more than 500 entities working to keep food on the tables of Arkansans and shape public policy related to hunger in the state. Sharon says MHP/Team SI, a full-service marketing agency, has been involved with the alliance since AHRA’s inception (this year it revamped the Serving Up Solutions branding with a new logo), but she was excited about getting more hands-on involvement within her family. At 10, Jonathan was a bit young to volunteer at the Arkansas Food Bank, but she and Carson showed up to volunteer as individuals, doing whatever needed doing. 

 

 

Carson says she was impressed with the efficiency of the operations. “The first day there were big boxes of cans, and we would take them and sort them into categories like vegetables, fruits, pasta, etc. Then the second time we went, we were making bags with different snacks in them,” she says. “There were people with snacks like applesauce, bars, all the things, who were putting them in the bag. You just walked in a circle with the bag, dropped the bag off, got a new bag, and walked in a circle. It was really good.”

 

The next time they volunteered, so did Carson’s whole soccer team. “It’s not a big-time commitment,” Sharon says. “It was two hours, super-organized, and it was such a great experience with her team.”

 

Then they thought bigger. “I went to the Arkansas Rising Soccer Club and asked, ‘How many teams do we have?’” Sharon says. “They embraced the idea. Between volunteer hours of multiple teams and families and cash donations that we solicited, we were able to put together the equivalent of 50,000 meals through that program. It was easy, it was fun, it was educational, people enjoyed it; we had a great time.”

 

Another family outing involved all four Vogelpohls taking the enlightening grocery shopping trip AHRA offers to teach people how to shop nutritionally within a budget. It’s one of many programs AHRA coordinates to create long-term solutions for hungry households; other in-person and virtual programs have taught cooking skills, gardening and other ways to get more nutritional benefits from each food dollar.

 

Jonathan was particularly surprised by what he learned about his family’s wheat bread.

 

“So the bread, basically it has more sugar in it than you’d think,” the 10-year-old explains. “And the bread we buy, Nature’s Own, is honey wheat, but it turns out it’s actually white, and they actually just dye it brown to look more nutritious!”

 

“There’s no whole wheat in the wheat bread!” Carl adds. 

 

Carson was impressed by the number of sugar packets that a single 20-ounce bottle of Coca-Cola contained. “There were I don’t even know how many sugar packets lined up in front of it,” Carson says. 

 

“It was 12! I counted,” Jonathan says. 

 

Perhaps the most evocative activity the Vogelpohls undertook to understand the food insecurity struggles of 22.5 percent of Arkansans — including one in three of the state’s children — was doing the SNAP Challenge, another program AHRA uses for education and awareness. The challenge is to subsist on only the $4.15 per person, per day that the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) provides for groceries for a week. If free school breakfasts and lunches are available to children, those meals don’t have to be included, so they help stretch the scant budget. 

 

Accustomed to buying whatever strikes their fancy, the family prepared what they thought was a reasonable shopping list, only to realize that they’d have to shrink it considerably to meet their budget. 

 

“I couldn’t believe the cost of ground beef!” says Sharon, who dropped the beef but insisted she couldn’t function without coffee (basic store brand, nothing fancy). Wanting to get ample fruits and vegetables, Carson negotiated her V8, and wanted crackers to go with the 15-bean soup they bought. To make room for those, they dropped a bag of apples and seven yogurts, Jonathan says. 

 

“I was shocked by the amount of planning that went into the shopping, and then the preparation time and all of the things that we take for granted with how we eat every day and how little $4.15 is,” says Sharon, who professes to not being a cook. “And I think Jonathan learned a lesson in that process.”

 

 

He nods sagely before pronouncing, “Hungry people can get grumpy, and you can be aggressive with your food.”

 

Using hand gestures to indicate the amounts, Jonathan says, “I used to pour a bunch of milk into my cereal. But when I realized there’s a limited amount, I started being more conservative. Now instead of pouring a bunch on like this big, I’m now only pouring this much.” 

 

Carson adds in her best big sister voice, “And not only policed himself, he also policed other people. It was like, ‘Get away from the milk!’”

 

“Hey,” Jonathan says. “Whatever someone puts in front of you, if you’re hungry, you’ll just eat it, straight up. I’m not joking. I wanted to lick my plate, but that’s impolite.”

 

Blending Solutions

 

Decreasing children’s hunger is a part of AHRA’s mission that’s particularly important to the Vogelpohls. One area Sharon was working on before the pandemic was the challenge of getting nutritious school breakfasts to hungry kids, while circumventing the stigma of free breakfasts and the logistic difficulties of getting the children from food-insecure homes reliably to school early enough for breakfast. 

 

The Vogelpohls displaying how much sugar is in a bottle of cola.

 

Sharon says in 2019 she joined AHRA Executive Director Kathy Webb and the organization in advocating for an innovative program that would replace sit-down breakfasts with nutritious fresh smoothies in take-out cups. “Then the kids not only are getting that complete meal, they’re able to just take it and eat it between first and second periods. So the adoption rate of that was really, really high.”

 

Post-pandemic, she says AHRA is working to get the program implemented in more schools. Schools already have the ingredients, but the impediment for most cafeterias is that they don’t have the disposable smoothie cups and need a commercial blender that costs about $1,000. These hurdles struck Sharon as simple solutions donors can solve for a huge benefit to children if they can just get the word out. 

 

“The science and the data show that kids who eat breakfast have less absenteeism, less illness, better school performance, better behavior, etc.,” she says. “So, it makes a big, big difference having access to those breakfast programs.”

 

Higher (F)Ed

 

The hunger doesn’t stop after 12th grade. Carl’s been working on a connector program with AHRA to unite Arkansas colleges and universities in meeting the “major need” for food pantries for college students. 

 

“Hunger and food insecurity continues all the way through college,” he says. “I think we had 30-some-odd colleges that came to the program. One of the challenges in talking about the issues is, [in] a lot of programs like this, you need to put a face to it, a name to it. But like Sharon said, there’s a stigma attached.

 

“Just like kids going through elementary school at their age can’t concentrate, the adults going through college programs can’t perform best if they’re hungry. They’re worried about, ‘Where’s my next meal coming from? Can I feed my kids?’ They can’t perform, either.”

 

He says AHRA’s statewide umbrella connecting these programs is particularly helpful because so many things happen in a vacuum. 

 

“Arkansans see a need and are generous and want to fill it,” Carl says. “That’s great, but being connected across the state through an alliance or a larger program really benefits because there are some shared experiences, shared knowledge of, ‘Who can we connect with resources to bring those programs together?’ Working cooperatively makes a big difference.”

 

Public (Table) Service

 

Sharon says she thinks one reason they were chosen as chairs is that “the other huge piece of the alliance’s responsibilities is advocacy, working towards getting lawmakers to better understand how these things work and how they can be helpful.” And that’s Carl’s expertise.

 

Carl says one reason he’s enthusiastic about Serving Up Solutions is its unique approach among Arkansas nonprofits. Rather than simply listening to a presentation of hunger statistics on a stage, guests participate throughout the evening in dynamic discourse about AHRA’s work with their wait staff, who happen to be Arkansas legislators.  

 

The 40 to 50 legislative wait staff, who will serve up dinner and solutions from both sides of the aisle, will also be competing with each other for the biggest tips from their tables. The tip money goes to their designated local food pantry or other hunger-related nonprofit. 

 

“What I can tell you as someone who’s been on the policy-making side of the equation for over a decade now, is … education goes beyond listening to someone talk or seeing graphics,” Carl says. “If you can involve people in the process in a meaningful way, that’s gold. And Serving Up Solutions provides an opportunity for legislators to engage with these issues directly.” 

 

Carl says hunger is also something about which the politically divided state can unite. 

 

“Hunger is an issue that brings a lot of people from a lot of different political viewpoints across the spectrum together, because we come from affected communities across Arkansas. This is not something that knows liberal, conservative, moderate, any of the equations. It’s something that touches all Arkansans no matter where they are. And it’s something that we can realize, ‘But for the grace of God, there go I.’ 

 

Sharon says that while they’re working to make the program less “stage-based” and more interactive, the event will include a seated dinner catered by local restaurateurs who are donating their skills and food, a silent auction and a live auction that is centered on uncommon experiences. “We’ve approached different folks about donating unique experiences,” she says. “A great example is Gov. Hutchinson has agreed to host a luncheon for six at the mansion with him, a perfect time to discuss issues important to you.”

 

“With this year being our agency’s 50th anniversary, we’re participating in a lot of things,” Sharon explains. “But when it came down to the decision about what event Carl and I and the family wanted to contribute to, this transcends everything. There’s no more basic need than making sure people don’t go hungry in Arkansas.”

 

“You can’t get an education or hold down a job if you’re hungry,” Carl says. “It’s a basic need. Food, shelter. If you’re hungry, I don’t care how much money the government sends to schools, to education, to anything else — if the kids are hungry, they’re not going to learn. It’s unconscionable that we have the hunger that we have in this country. But we can’t fix anything else until we fix that.”

 

 Sharon says like the event and AHRA’s work connecting hunger resources across the state, the most important message they hope to share is solution-focused. Besides giving money — which is wonderful and always appreciated — there are countless ways to contribute to solving Arkansans’ food insecurity individually and in large groups. “Volunteer hours are as good as money to them, because without volunteers, they have to pay people to do these ongoing jobs.”

 

“Whether it’s as an individual family, through your workplace, through your kids’ sports, do something,” she urges. “Challenge yourself to do something, because there is an enormous amount of opportunity to get involved in this issue, and it’s about as foundational as it gets. Food and literacy, baby. That’s what’s going to change the world.” 

 

 

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