The Yellow Springs Community Foundation’s Youth Action Board has spent four of the last five years fighting youth food insecurity in their community.
This year, the board raised over $12,000 for three local initiatives that provide direct access to nutritious food. That funding was then matched by the Community Foundation for a grand total of $36,000 in grants.
"The way we described it — fundraising, to impact partners — was that food insecurity, compared to a lot of issues that we've tackled in the past, is really wide reaching and also just really persistent," said Cole Oberg, a senior on the Youth Action Board. "It's basically impossible to raise one round of funding and just eliminate food insecurity. So we frame it as plugging holes essentially wherever we can."
The Youth Action Board is a youth philanthropy group made up of 33 students in Yellow Springs high school and middle school.
Seventeen-year-old Nora Bongorno has been on the board for two years and she said she joined the board initially for community service hours but continued participating to help her community.
"For students, before joining Youth Action Board, I didn't feel as connected with my community and I didn't feel like I was making a huge difference and helping people," she said. "But now I feel like my voice, I have a place where it can be heard and I have a club where I can go and help people and make a difference."
Grants this year were awarded to Food2Go to offer weekend food packs to over 50 local kids and the Community Kitchen Project to buy new appliances.
"We're specifically funding appliances for the kitchen that needs to be updated," said Aiden Scavone, a senior serving his fourth year on the Youth Action Board. "Last year we funded the Community Kitchen too, but we didn't have enough funds to complete the project. So we're continuing to fund the kitchen, and hopefully it will be done."
“We've saved a number of families from eviction."
Wills Oberg is a 15-year-old freshman serving his first year on the Youth Action Board and he said Food2Go has already started to put their grant money to work.
"We've already given them $2,160 to fund 50 students in the Yellow Springs School District or the Greene County ESC through the end of the year for one backpack every weekend," he said. "And there's been plenty of funding set aside for next year to fund 50 more or the same students for the 2025-2026 school year."
The group also used a third of the money to distribute coupons to Yellow Springs schools' guidance counselors for students in need to use at Tom’s Market.
The Outreach Manager for the Yellow Springs Community Foundation, Melissa Heston, said they recently distributed $5,000 worth of coupons to give out before the school year ends.
Working to Find Solutions
The board decides what issues to address based on board testimonies, community surveys, and expert panels. Each year, food insecurity has come out as a leading issue.
Jane Chambers is a senior at Yellow Springs High School and member of the Youth Action Board. She said the board has decided to address this issue by dividing the money into three categories.
“A long-term solution with the community kitchen, a short-term solution with Tom's Coupons, and then something that directly impacts the youth with Food2Go,” she said.
Scavone said they have gone beyond just fundraising for the community.
“We've saved a number of families from eviction," he said. "We've passed out thousands of hygiene kits, things like that, where we can see our direct impact.”
Members of the board said they also hope to address other local issues in the future including better access to public transportation.
"We talked to representatives from different transit services around the area and people are definitely interested in making public transportation more accessible and available around here," said Cole Oberg. "If that's something that is still possible in the future because that's definitely something that's more long-term in nature."
Chambers agrees with Oberg. She said the main issue holding the board back from tackling the public transport issue is how massive of an undertaking it would be for a youth organization.
"Even though our group does a lot of good and even though the Community Foundation is our parent organization and does all of these things, creating a public transportation system is extremely difficult," she said. "Especially when you're meeting for an hour and a half every Wednesday after school. I think largely, we found a lot of interesting solutions, and I think that our group was extremely innovative with things that we were coming up with. However, the larger thing is that it would be kind of a job for people every day, a full-time job."
Going forward, the board is still accepting donations to support their efforts to end youth food insecurity.
More information and details on funding can be online at yscf.org.
