Funds to Feed Grantee: Orchard Community Learning Center

The Orchard Community Learning Center (OCLC) gathers growers, local farmers, and nature lovers to empower real, local food in Phoenix. From collaborating with the Spaces of Opportunity incubator farms to hosting local farmers markets, OCLC’s programs focus on tapping into the healthy roots of families’ cultures and organically grown produce. 

During the pandemic, OCLC worked to ensure families had healthy, fresh foods. It delivered tote bags with whole and plant-based foods and produce, meals, and recipes to community members, working with under-resourced farmers and growers to stock the tote bags. 

In 2020, the organization focused on operations to get food to people quickly: weighing product, packing dry goods and produce, and delivering the bags. Later, John Wann-Ángeles, director of OCLC, explains how OCLC tweaked its model to engage even more intentionally with the community. OCLC partnered with the Cesar Chavez Foundation, Sí Se Puede Neighborhood Association, and school districts to expand their reach and deepen engagement with local families. 

Community distribution with the Sí Se Puede Neighborhood Association

Through the Cesar Chavez Foundation, OCLC made connections to senior centers in West Phoenix. With the support of the Cesar Chavez Foundation and Sí Se Puede Neighborhood Association, OCLC began reaching out to community members via WhatsApp, their preferred contact method. This ensured those most in need were notified first of food drop-offs. Another partnership with an elementary school led to a robust resource center where children and families can access fresh foods from OCLC and school supplies and clothing. 

OCLC ultimately works to engage people in thinking more about where our food comes from and how we can connect to heritage foods. John highlights, “The primary generators of chronic disease are what we eat; thanks to the marketing of unhealthy foods by processed food corporations and agribusiness, this message has been delivered inappropriately from corporate sources. We want to spark conversations about eating the way our grandparents did.”

Brenda Montoya, Sí Se Puede and Virginia Ángeles-Wann, OCLC

Funds to Feed has supported OCLC in delivering more than 9,600 healthy meals to families since 2020. Although much of the federal relief that allowed organizations like OCLC to meet increased community need for food has wound down, John emphasizes that the need hasn’t gone away. He continues to have conversations with school districts and other local groups about the food insecurities families face. 

Still, federal relief during the height of the pandemic and the Funds to Feed program are a model for what grassroots organizations can accomplish—when given the resources. John shares, “Funding came to a more grassroots level during COVID-19 than ever before from federal sources.” When funding is directed to local community groups like this, John says it helps to “honor and respect the cultures of the peoples and multitudes of places around the continents that people here come from.”