Banking on Our Community
by Jeannine Gage
Several years before moving to Longwood, Derrick Chubbs felt like something was missing. Most of his career had been spent in the tech industry, with stints as a corporate executive with IBM and Dell under his belt.
“I had no complaints with my corporate experience. It was very good to me,” says Derrick, “but I got to a point where I felt a sense of obligation and responsibility to do more.”
Derrick had lived in Austin, Texas, for several years and was an active volunteer with the American Red Cross, community shelters, and mentoring programs. He realized he enjoyed the volunteer work more than his paying job.
“I knew it was time to make a change,” he says.
Derrick took a job with the Red Cross, eventually managing operations for nine states.
However, he says, “I became a bureaucrat and removed from what I loved about volunteering there in the first place.”
So, when a position became available with the Central Texas Food Bank, he took it.
“Austin is such a great city, but I didn’t know about the hunger problem,” says Derrick. “Right from the beginning, I loved that job and working to solve hunger.”
Derrick and his wife Loly began to think about where they wanted to eventually retire, with their three sons grown and living in different cities around the country. So, when a corporate headhunter called inquiring if Derrick would be interested in the chief executive officer/president position for Second Harvest Food Bank of Central Florida, Derrick put his name in the running. He got the job and the couple made the move, settling into the Sweetwater neighborhood in Longwood two years ago.
Keeping the Harvest Going
Second Harvest’s main location in Orlando is a 110,000-square-foot facility, most of which is taken up by a giant warehouse. Currently, that warehouse is brimming with food. Essentials such as canned goods, pasta, bread, and milk are ready to be taken out and distributed to hungry people in seven Central Florida counties, including Seminole.
But that bounty could diminish at any moment.
“If food stopped coming through that door,” says Derrick, pointing to massive garage-style doors in the warehouse, “this place would be completely empty in two weeks.”
It is a sobering thought, considering Second Harvest and its community-feeding partners distribute around 300,000 meals a day.
“The need has grown exponentially,” says Derrick, “and we don’t see those numbers declining anytime soon.”
Besides making sure there is enough food (approximately 98 million pounds is distributed annually), one of the main challenges Derrick faces in his position is the perception of hunger.
“There’s the mindset of, ‘Well, if you’re hungry, why don’t you just get a job?’” he says. “But poverty and hunger are complicated. They have many moving parts and the face of hunger is evolving.”
Studies show that 66 to 78 percent of working Americans live paycheck to paycheck. And 13 to 15 percent of Americans will need some sort of food assistance.
In Seminole County, Second Harvest distributes eight to 10 million pounds of food annually.
‘There’s a perception that Seminole County is affluent. And much of it is,” says Derrick, “but there are large areas that are not.”
Nina Yon of The Sharing Center in Longwood – one of Second Harvest’s feeding partners – agrees.
“There is a constant growing need here,” says Nina. “There are so many pockets of poor population that just aren’t seen.”
Teaming Up To Feed Those In Need
The two non-profits work together in several ways. Second Harvest sells food to The Sharing Center at a huge discount and awards them grants for operations.
“Without this partnership with Second Harvest,” says Nina, “we wouldn’t be able to do what we do.”
The Sharing Center is also part of Second Harvest’s Grocery Alliance. Non-profits around the Central Florida area are assigned to pick up food from corporate partners such as Publix, ALDI, and Sam’s Club that would otherwise go to waste. That food goes directly to the feeding partners’ facilities. Other corporate partners include Darden Restaurants and The Walt Disney Company.
Other new programs in the partnership include mobile food distribution.
“We had to mobilize during the pandemic, and we saw how well it worked – getting out into the areas where assistance is needed,” says Derrick. “So, we are working on expanding that.”
More than helping logistically, the mobile distribution solves an obstacle that keeps many people from getting food assistance: pride. Derrick says he knows this from personal experience.
“I was a poor college student, but no one ever knew it,” he says. “I worked two jobs but still couldn’t always feed myself. And that made me feel like a failure, because that is the stigma of hunger. But nothing could be further from the truth.”
Going forward, Derrick’s priorities are to position Second Harvest to be prepared for future needs and to strengthen the organization’s visibility and collaborations with the community.
“The root cause of hunger is poverty,” says Derrick. “And poverty is not anything that any one food bank can solve. It’s going to take a collective action at all levels. Food banks, government, corporate partners – all of us.”
Volunteers:
An Asset Worth Celebrating
Volunteers are one of the biggest assets that Second Harvest Food Bank of Central Florida has. More than 48,500 volunteers worked more than 131,100 hours between July 2023 and June 2024 across Second Harvest’s seven-county area.
“Volunteers save me more than $5 million a year,” says Derrick Chubbs, the nonprofit organization’s president and CEO. “That buys a lot of food.”
Many of those volunteers come from Seminole County, and one was recently recognized as a volunteer of the year. Oviedo resident Andrea Patenaude was given the Going the Extra Mile award for consistently exceeding expectations. For the past 16 years, Andrea has dedicated hundreds of hours to Second Harvest’s many big events and continues to advocate for hunger relief efforts by sharing stories with others.
“Volunteers are the heartbeat of our hunger relief efforts in Central Florida,” says Derrick.