San Francisco-Marin Food Bank is proving that people with lived experience of hunger have a multitude of expertise to lend to food banks.

Like a growing number of food banks, it already taps its participants to tell their personal stories to legislators to advocate for policy change. Soon it will introduce a program called CalFresh Ambassadors, which will train people with lived experience to do SNAP application assistance. 

Its freshest effort involves engaging participants to act as Peer Navigators. These experts draw upon their own background of navigating social services to help others access services that go beyond food. They are not case managers, but fellow neighbors with shared experiences, giving them a fast track to building trust and community.  

“What really makes this model powerful is that the connection is rooted into peer-to-peer support that is centered around the knowledge that is acquired only through lived experience,” said Noriko Lim-Tepper, Chief Strategic Partnerships, Advocacy & Voice Officer.

The Peer Navigators are closely tied to the food bank’s Community Markets, which it sees as the next evolution of the food pantry. The markets resemble neighborhood grocery stores, offering the opportunity to shop from displays of fresh produce and culturally connected food at extended hours. Central to their mission is to connect people to supportive services to help them address the reasons they’re seeking charitable food in the first place.

The food bank has so far opened two Community Markets that it owns and operates. At these sites, Peer Navigators offer approachable one-on-one support in a dedicated space within the market. “Making warm referrals is the heart of the work,” said Guadalupe Gonzalez, Bi-Lingual Community Connections Manager, during a recent webinar hosted by More Than Food Consulting. “It’s not just, ‘Here’s a number,’ but ‘Let’s call together.’”

Two other markets are located at community-based organizations that already offer help in navigating social services. At those sites, food serves as a draw to get more people in to find out about social support. One of them, La Raza Community Resource Center, has tripled its service since partnering with the food bank, noted Gabriel Medina, Executive Director.

Whether the markets are led by community partners or the food bank itself, they serve the common goal of pairing food access and social services “under one roof to create an integrated service model,” Lim-Tepper said.

SF-Marin Food Bank’s initiative is comparable to other strategic efforts by food banks to pair a broad range of social services with food distribution. Many of those efforts have resulted in the construction of large-scale centers, usually with warehouses, that include dedicated space to house a wide range of community partners. Mid-Ohio Food Collective’s Eastland Prosperity Center, Feeding Tampa Bay’s Causeway Center, and Greater Cleveland Food Bank’s Community Resource Center are all examples of this community-service approach to food banking.

SF-Marin Food Bank is putting a spin on that concept by putting individual food pantries at the center of outreach. It sees food pantries as ideal spots to provide pathways to long-term support because they are “trusted, low-barrier spaces,” Gonzalez said. “We see participants show up on a weekly basis, and those visits open the door for meaningful conversations.” She added, “When a person begins to trust you enough to say, ‘I’m dealing with an eviction or I don’t understand my benefits paperwork,’ that’s a moment where we have the opportunity to help and transform a life.”

The Community Markets have embraced a practice of warm referrals, which includes three components, according to the food bank. The first is trust and connection, which begins with genuine friendly conversation. The second is partnerships with vetted community organizations that are known to be open, available and accessible, offering culturally competent services and language support. “It’s not just a number that we found on the web, but it’s an individual who will answer the call to get the participants started in the services,” Gonzalez said. The final component is reducing barriers by, say, calling together to make an appointment or explaining paperwork in a participant’s language. “Participants want information, but more importantly, they want someone who doesn’t rush them, judge them, or confuse them,” Gonzalez said. 

The food bank recruits its Peer Navigators from its volunteer database, requesting that they commit to six to eight hours a week over six months. After getting training on warm referrals and preferred community partners, they begin making their own connections with participants. They receive a modest stipend of about $100 a month, designed to keep their wages below a taxable amount.

In SF-Marin Food Bank’s view, Peer Navigators are capable of supercharging a pantry experience that emphasizes dignity and choice. “Peer leadership is powerful,” Gonzalez said. “Shared lived experiences reduce shame, empower our participants, and help them feel understood and capable, and that they’re not alone in this.” – Chris Costanzo

CAPTION FOR PHOTO, TOP:  Glenn, a Peer Navigator, also served as a volunteer on San Francisco-Marin Food Bank’s advocacy council.

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