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Nevada Food at First reports ARPA-funded meal expansion, fresh-food rescues and staffing gains
Summary
Nevada Food at First told the Board it used ARPA funds to expand meal distribution, rescue produce and hire its first paid community engagement specialist; 2024 meal totals and 2025 early-year figures were presented.
Barb, a representative of Nevada Food at First, told the Story County Board of Supervisors on June 3 that the nonprofit used ARPA funds to expand neighborhood meal stops, rescue more perishable food and hire its first paid community engagement specialist.
Barb said, “In 2024, Nevada Food First served a total of 34,797 meals,” an increase she attributed in part to state changes affecting SNAP access and reductions in other household supports. She added that monthly meal averages ranged from about 320 per night in March to a peak of 396 per night in November 2024.
The nut graf: the ARPA-funded changes, Nevada Food at First officials said, allowed the group to add neighborhood meal stops, increase rescued food used for prepared meals and begin paying a part-time community engagement specialist to maintain volunteers and donors.
Barb said rescued food totaled more than 53 tons in 2024 and that, in the first five months of 2025, monthly meal averages ranged from 351 to 383, totaling more than 15,300 meals. She listed local retail and grocery partners including Nevada Dollar Fresh, Nevada Dollar General, DG Market on Lincoln Way, Crumble Cookies and Hy-Vee North Ankeny as food-donation partners.
Nevada Food at First also hired Lindsay Henkel of State Center as its first paid community engagement specialist on Oct. 1, 2024; the position is budgeted at 12 hours a week at $15 per hour, and the presenter said Henkel averages 40–45 hours per month on outreach and volunteer coordination.
Barb described a lost AmeriCorps position the organization had planned to host; the federal program was terminated during recruitment in late April. Looking to fall 2025, she said Nevada Food at First and Collins–Maxwell school administration have agreed to add neighborhood meal stops in Collins and Maxwell when the schools move to a four-day week, with additional meal stops and school pantry support planned beginning Sept. 1, 2025.
The presentation drew board praise but no formal county action.
