Karl McCollester (00:05)
Welcome to Mighty Municipalities, the podcast about small municipalities and how they can punch above their weight. I'm your host, Karl McCollester and along with my co-host, Mark Partin and our guests, we take you through the highs and lows of working in a small municipality. Whether it's the hardship and frustrations that are holding you back, or the progress and wins that are propelling you forward, we're here to share the lessons learned and give you strategies to help improve your community. Hey, Mark, how's it going for you today?

Mark Partin (00:31)
It's going very well. Here we are just before Memorial Day and kick off of the official summer season. So looking forward to what the next few months have to bring.

Karl McCollester (00:41)
Yes, I jumped the gun and wore linen already this week. I figure in the South, I think that rule can't really apply once it gets above 90 degrees. I think that's my floor anyway.

Mark Partin (00:51)
That's right, yes.

Karl McCollester (00:54)
we missed our last if you want to call our regular cadence every two weeks you know, I was on vacation and off with My nephew who just graduated from high school on a post high school road trip that he was wanting to do And so we we started putting this episode together back then two weeks ago But with my schedule, we just couldn't make it across the finish line. So hopefully

Everybody finds what we talk about today worth the wait. ⁓

Mark Partin (01:18)
That's

right. And congratulations to your nephew and to all graduates because this is the season of college and high school graduation. So congratulations to all of you.

Karl McCollester (01:29)
Absolutely, absolutely. And

so today, the topic that we're going to want to talk about was food insecurity and managing that within your small municipality. Because I think that's something that really, at least every municipality I've worked with, certainly there is some impact in that and there's something that impacts their community.

Mark Partin (01:50)
Yes. So, you know, as Karl said today, we're going to talk about food insecurity. And while most of what we talk about applies to small communities, food insecurity is, an issue in communities of all sizes. So I'm going to throw some statistics at you in a few moments that are nationwide, not specific to larger small communities, but as with so many other things that we talk about in small communities.

the visibility of it is magnified and you quite often personally know people who have had these challenges. So that's one reason we really want to talk about it today. And as I mentioned, some of these statistics are very alarming. For instance, 13 % of the people in the United States face food insecurity. And I guess first of all, we should define what food insecurity is.

This is not the textbook definition, but in many cases, people do not have a source of good quality, fresh food within a reasonable distance that they're able to get to, or they don't have public transportation or personal transportation that can get them there. So oftentimes that means going to a local convenience store, but while they are serving a need, the...

Karl McCollester (03:10)
Mm-hmm.

Mark Partin (03:11)
assortment of food they're able to access there is not always the most nutritious. So that's a general definition of food insecurity. And some people may be more familiar with food deserts where commercial grocery stores are not, again, within the traveling distance or walking distance of where people live. So 13 % of the population faces food insecurity. 15.9 % of those are rural.

Karl McCollester (03:24)
Mm-mm.

Right.

Mark Partin (03:41)
rural communities, which is many of the communities that we like to talk about on the Mighty Municipalities podcast. And then regionally, a lot of it falls in the South. So 86 % of the counties with the highest rates of food insecurity are located in the Southern States. And 86 % are rural again. So not just the population.

Karl McCollester (04:00)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Mark Partin (04:07)
people wise, the number of counties are rural counties. And here in South Carolina, unfortunately, 20 % of our counties can be designated as food insecure. So it's an issue that we face every day. And as I said earlier, we often know people who face these challenges. The highest county in our three state region of North, South Carolina and Georgia.

Karl McCollester (04:20)
Mm-hmm.

Mark Partin (04:32)
is located in Georgia and that's Tailfair County and it has 23.1 % of their population facing food insecurity. know, one fifth, almost one fourth of their population has food insecurities and that's alarming and is really a challenge for resource scarce communities and individuals. So this is a really important topic in

Karl McCollester (04:46)
Right.

Mm-hmm.

Mark Partin (05:02)
One that think deserves some attention, especially as we go into the summer season because so many kids go home from school and school is in many cases their main source of nutrition during the school year. So this is a very timely topic as well.

Karl McCollester (05:19)
And when you're in a rural community, know, and going back to Telfair like you said, one in four people. that is a mind boggling statistic. there are many communities here in South Carolina who right around that 20 percent, that one in five level. And just again, being rural or in a small town as Mark mentioned, the idea of having that food desert where there is not a

source of fresher quality food in a walkable distance. All those things with poverty, exacerbate each other and you don't really have the options to get any food or to, go to places where you can maintain a store of quality food. So you're down to those choices. mentioned of the convenience store or the fast food place nearby, things like that.

certainly impact your child's health and therefore their mental health, their ability to concentrate at school, all those other things. So it can be incredibly...

distressing for you as a parent or if you're our age and have older parents who also cannot get out of the house and they are therefore, very limited in what they can obtain just to eat on a day-to-day basis. It can be something that can take up a large amount of a person's day just, trying to figure out how to get the food on the table. this is a critical need.

so what we want to do is go through some things that you can do as a small municipality and a lot of these things they're from the worldhealthinfo.org and of course we'll share these links as always a lot of these ideas come from that the very first thing I think that a municipality can do that can help that again does not take a whole lot of effort something that even our smallest municipalities with just one or two staff

can do is again compiling that information and making it available. checking with your churches, your libraries, and your civic organizations and understanding and just cataloging, inventorying what is out there. does this church have a meal program or a grocery give out on every third Sunday and then this other church down the road happens to do that.

every second Sunday. Well, now at least you've compiled two weeks in a row where your residents can go and get some decent food stuffs for their families. So putting all those pieces together of what's out there, even as small as those little, free libraries, especially during COVID time, you know, and I've seen little free pantries as well. There's one near my house that I tend to, you when I'm walking by on my way back from the grocery store, try to stock with a few cans as we're going to do.

Mark Partin (07:38)
Yes.

Karl McCollester (07:39)
to do. So even those kind of things in your community, letting people know about them and just putting that into a quick flyer, even just type it up in Word with addresses and have it available, add it to your website.

you can use one of the AI chat things to give them the list of what they are and ask them to build you a nice map and they can probably do that for you pretty quickly and make it look good. But just having something like that to share, I think is a very easy first step that we as a municipality can do to...

simplify some of the data collection that our people may have to do, which they may not be able to do because they're older and don't have access to the internet. Or of course again, some of these things aren't always on the internet, especially in more rural communities.

Mark Partin (08:20)
That's right. Yeah. So there is a community not too far away from Sumter Lamar, South Carolina, which is a small town, very rural area, probably 10 or 15 miles from Florence, about 30 miles from Sumter. So kind of remotely located. And we had the opportunity to interview Tim Dargan, who works in Lamar. And we learned a little bit about the

programs that they have tried, the community-wide programs that they were able to use to attack the issue of food insecurity. And so we were glad to have him as one of our guests and happy to share that conversation with you now.

Karl McCollester (08:58)
So again, today we're talking about food insecurity and we're excited to welcome a guest to the podcast today, Mr. Tim Dargan from the Town of Lamar. Tim, how are you doing?

Timothy Dargan (09:08)
Doing good, Karl yourself.

Karl McCollester (09:10)
Very good, very good, thank you. And so, Tim, one of the things I remember, in coming by and working with you all was the sign for the food giveaways. And so we're interested in talking about that and understanding, how that came about. Before we do that, tell us a little bit about how you got started and what brought you to local government.

Timothy Dargan (09:30)
Actually, I started working for the town of Lamar in April of 2020. And that was right when the pandemic kind of came about. And I had just finished, I went to school, back to school, and I was trying to take a little break in between. But the town found out that I was taking a break. And they asked me to come and work for a little while. And I told them I would work for like maybe a year or so. And of course, six years later, I'm still working with the town in a different capacity. Now I'm still the town administrator.

Karl McCollester (09:37)
Okay.

Yes.

Mark Partin (09:40)
Wow.

Karl McCollester (09:45)
Hmm.

Ha ha.

Hahaha

Timothy Dargan (10:00)
But matter of fact, during that time, April was several months later, the pandemic where the town wanted to do something to help the citizens. And they came up with the idea about the food giveaway. So in the beginning, was actually two different things. The town was going to like a church community-based program, but we were doing something every Friday. There was also another organization, a church in town, Lamar United Methodist Church, Fran Knott started it.

Karl McCollester (10:19)
well.

Timothy Dargan (10:25)
They did a real big one one Saturday. So they did it one time, but we kept doing it over and over and over. They was partnering with Harvest Hope over there in Florence And again, like I said, we was getting out of coming out of Lee County. So at some point, the town stopped doing it every because the program started drying up. But Fran Noss decided to keep the quality. They turned to a quality giveaway with Harvest Hope. So what she did, Fran Noss got some of the local churches and passed it together.

Karl McCollester (10:44)
Yeah.

Timothy Dargan (10:53)
what you're supposed to do is donate a certain amount of money and some of your volunteers to help get it going. as a group, we had several people from different churches come together. What they used to do, she put out a schedule in advance, really for the whole year. And there are certain days when you go to Harvest Hope to pack up non-perishable.

And maybe the following week you go and pack up the canned goods, the dry goods. And then the following week we will have the actual food giveaway. Now what we do, like I said, we have volunteers from different churches. We have the police department involved in those, we have so many people. I remember when we first started, they would be lining up at town hall all the around prayer street, all the way back to the light. And remember during that time, it was a great need for it. And even after the need subsided and the pandemic.

Karl McCollester (11:36)
Wow.

Timothy Dargan (11:41)
The pandemic kinda stayed around for a while, but they still kept coming. It was at one point, it like two hours that we got so coordinated, organized with, the whole thing took an hour. So we started at 12 o'clock, we go at one o'clock. So many people used to come. But I always told them one of the main things about doing something like that, there are a lot of things people can do to help someone, but there's nothing like helping somebody in a particular person really show their appreciation. You might get 100 people.

Karl McCollester (11:52)
Hmph. Hmph.

Mark Partin (11:54)
you

Karl McCollester (12:05)
Mm-hmm.

Timothy Dargan (12:07)
But you might have a five that are really, really, really grateful. And that makes your day. If you get one grateful, that makes you a day But to have 100 people come along, that's something else. We used to try to have like 200 boxes. So when we do it, it's like least 200 different families that come through to get that. So again, like I said, we now we're back onto that schedule once a quarter, so four times a year. And Ms. Knox, no longer over, we have a new council member named Jessica Myers. She's taking the reins now. She's doing that.

Karl McCollester (12:13)
Mm-hmm.

Timothy Dargan (12:35)
And when I first left the town to go work for the county, and like I said, I still work in the town. I used to go back and forth. I love doing that. But now the schedule kind of too tight. So I don't get a chance to go back. But I miss it. I really miss it. Yes, Yes, sir. It's all about helping people in the time of need and it's giving back.

Mark Partin (12:44)
Thank

Karl McCollester (12:45)
I bet.

Nice.

Mark Partin (12:54)
So I heard you say this originally started out as a town initiative as well as largely churches, but now it sounds like you're coming together and different agencies, different churches coming together. So what is it like coordinating a public private partnership, if you will?

Timothy Dargan (13:12)
But it's a great, great partnership and a great fellowship. For the most part, I think if you were to talk to somebody, the best people probably would be churches, a pastor, you people that got the mindset of giving. So they have that, you know, and we got great pastors in the town of Lamar. And then Town Hall, they always say it was about the people, never about the staff or the officials. It's all about the people. We serve them, those who are elected, you're elected by the people.

Those who get paid on staff, you pay by the people. So everything we're doing is about the people. So that's an extension as far as we're concerned of giving back to the people that we serve. It takes a lot of leadership and it takes a lack of ego to do that kind of thing. It can't be about, I thought about it first, my church got more people than your church. We never have any of that. We come together and one thing we always do, and always did, I hope they still do it, we always pray for it. Most of the I'll be the one that speak, even if the pastor was there.

I will remind everyone, you know, this is a charitable event. We're not trying to embarrass anyone. We're not trying to toot our own horn. We're just trying to help people and serve God. And we always pray and that set the tone for that. Every now and then we have somebody who come in, we might have a volunteer, they might get a little aggressive with the people coming in. And I would politely come to the side and tell them, don't forget you're trying to serve.

Karl McCollester (14:26)
you

Timothy Dargan (14:32)
Once or twice I had to ask somebody to They meant well, but they kind of caused some friction there. So we had to get rid of the friction. Yes. That's a great thing.

Karl McCollester (14:39)
⁓ no, Right.

That's great. So, yeah, you all started with just the, you know, with the council and the churches. How did you all get Harvest Hope involved, which is the regional food bank?

Timothy Dargan (14:56)
But actually, again, Ms. Fran, I give a lot of credit that when she started, when they did it first time, it was through Harvest Hope. So we kept doing that. They did some things, changed and evolved over the years because one time you just, you you went and got the food, you came and served, gave the food and that was it. Then they started kind of screenlining where you had fill out applications, you know, how many people's in the home. So after a while we had to start getting somebody to go outside, you know, walk to all the cars and get your name. And some people didn't want to do all that because they felt you were trying to get too much information.

Karl McCollester (15:00)
Mm-hmm.

Okay.

Timothy Dargan (15:24)
We would get the names, get how many people, blah, blah, blah, kind of thing. But ever since then, we've been working with Harvest Hope. And every now and then, they would come out and they help, would assist, or they would just look at everything to see how it was going. And we have other agencies Genesis Community Foundation. They got a new name now. But at least two or three times, they even came out and helped and did their own food giveaway. So it's been great. And sometimes even the churches, apart from Harvest Hope,

Karl McCollester (15:31)
Okay.

Okay.

Okay.

Mm-hmm.

Timothy Dargan (15:49)
And

apart from the town, have been churches individually doing that same time frame they have given to the community and given to their people.

Karl McCollester (15:54)
Hmm.

Mark Partin (15:57)
Have you seen any,

Like what's the spirit around town, like the cooperativeness, the getting along and has that changed since you started this program?

Timothy Dargan (16:07)
At least on those days, on the giveaway days, everybody friendly. Yeah, for the most part, yeah, it creates an atmosphere of togetherness, know, harmony and helping one another. a lot of times, there were people, and there were groups that was kind of, I would say, standoffish in the beginning. And there's some people that don't believe me, but believe it or not, some don't believe it in giving like that. And we changed a few minds. There's still one or two still don't believe me, stuff like that. As I said earlier.

Karl McCollester (16:10)
I love you.

Mark Partin (16:10)
Thank

Karl McCollester (16:13)
Right.

Right.

Okay.

Mark Partin (16:35)
Yes.

Timothy Dargan (16:36)
You can help one person, that you're doing a great thing. And the word of mouth spread people, come, they be lined up. We started at 12, usually at 11, they lined up. I remember one time a lady came from another county. It was like past Columbia, because she heard about it. And she was out there like seven o'clock in the morning. And I went to the car who is this? I just know it's long time. And she said, well, I heard about the giveaway. And you could tell she really needed it. And I went to embarrass her. I said, well, you know, it don't start until 12 o'clock. I said,

Karl McCollester (16:52)
well.

Mark Partin (16:57)
for our

Karl McCollester (17:02)
Mm-hmm.

Timothy Dargan (17:05)
Poocha hadn't got here yet, she I'll just wait. And she waited, she waited. She was so grateful. I remember she was crying. I think we gave her an extra box, kind of thing. But some things like that, we know word-of-mouth spreads. And it's important. Small little Lamar, all these times she had to pass to get to Lamar, she found and wanted to be blessed by our small town. So yeah, things like that spread. A lot of times, bad news spread, probably spread faster.

Karl McCollester (17:18)
Mm-hmm.

Right.

Timothy Dargan (17:33)
But good news might be a little slower, but good news does spread. And good deeds as well.

Mark Partin (17:37)
That's right.

Karl McCollester (17:39)
That's great. I can imagine the impact on the community as well, just as far as, knowing that something like this is happening. And, that,

Not that the community has your back every day, because we'd all love to, but the resources aren't there. knowing that people are doing in the community what they can to help, as the saying goes, those less fortunate than us, right? Or by the grace of God, go we kind of thing, right? ⁓

Timothy Dargan (18:02)
Exactly.

Yes.

Karl McCollester (18:06)
how those things can really impact the rest of the community. Yeah, so as you mentioned, somebody came from several counties away. So is there any eligibility requirements for people when they come?

Timothy Dargan (18:16)
Not really. We kind of say, and you kind of hope it to be for the town, but anybody that come, know, where they come near or far, we're going to serve. We're not going to say, well, you're from this county, get out. You know, we're not going to do that. We're going to send out three or four people in the car from different families. You kind of like, okay, we still, you know, give them four different boxes.

Karl McCollester (18:21)
Mm-hmm.

Right.

Right. That's great.

Right, right, aww, that's great. So, and when is the next one for y'all? Like you said you're doing it quarterly now. Is that like, what months? Okay.

Mark Partin (18:38)
Bye.

Timothy Dargan (18:45)
Yeah, so it should be June. Should be June. Yes, sir.

I

Yeah.

Karl McCollester (18:51)
That's great, that's No,

well mark any other questions from your side

Mark Partin (18:57)
No, just if you were starting it all over again or if you were a town that hears this and says, we need that, we would like to do that, what would be some advice you would give to that town about getting started?

Karl McCollester (18:59)
Thank

Timothy Dargan (19:10)
Okay, so you have to have a great partnership. And in most cases, I would probably recommend if they have one near Harvest Hope. You have to set up guidelines and dates and all these things that are pre-planning. So you want to help make sure that you have a good partner. And then your team, you need people that are to help spread the word. If you have an event that they're going to be there to help pack, they're going to be there to help give the food away. You got to set all that up in advance. know, those type of things. Have a place to go a certain time. Make sure it's open at that type of thing. So you would have to do all that. A great partner.

a great team, make sure you have the right place. And you've tried to have logistics, so how we did, when we first started the first time, you learned you go long, we had the fire department, we were only using one door, it took forever. So I told the mayor and I told Ms. Knox you know we have three doors, why don't we do something different? What do mean, Tim? I said, let's instead of having the truck come a little earlier, It might take a little extra work, but let's make all three of those doors accessible. What we did, we divided into three different sections.

Mark Partin (19:54)
Thank

Karl McCollester (20:06)
That was

Timothy Dargan (20:08)
So when people came,

we had three cards at a time instead of one. So as you know, you know, it went a whole lot quicker. Yes, yes. And you had a group. you went one door, instead of everybody at one door rushing out all in the way, you had five people at this door, five at that door, five at that door. And it worked smoothly. They still doing that of fact. So yeah, as you go along, you learn little tricks and pick up little things to make it better, make it easier. But planning, like where everything gets planted is really key. You know, you gotta have a heart. And things like being charitable and giving, somebody in the lead part.

Karl McCollester (20:12)
that's great. Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Timothy Dargan (20:36)
has to have a good heart caring and concerned about people and people's welfare. Because anybody can't do that. I mean, they can do it, but they'll be, you know, the one had the right spirit, the right atmosphere, and they'll run people away, turn people off, like as I had to do once or twice along the way. the right spirit. Yes, sir.

Mark Partin (20:40)
All

Karl McCollester (20:43)
Hmm. Right.

Mm-hmm. Right.

That's great. So y'all are using your fire station in all three bays and then just run every way through. That's a great way to do it. So multiple cues.

Mark Partin (20:56)
Yes.

Timothy Dargan (20:59)
by Department B. Yes, sir.

And this is to tell you about the partnership. Yes, sir.

We have to call the fire department because they actually belong to the county, but they have some of their fire trusts in the base. And when we do it, we have to call them in advance so they were moving it. So they have to kind of work with us to make sure they move. We have to call the police department chief to make sure they got organized for the traffic. So we have to call several different people to kind of make sure things are going. Sometimes, the, I have to say, the people at the bank or the post office, they can't come.

Karl McCollester (21:15)
Mm-hmm.

Timothy Dargan (21:29)
So we get somebody to take boxes to them. So it's a great community effort and partnership. And it's something that we have near the end sometimes, we like to get in and get out. Every now and then, it get a little slow at the end. We have more food than we thought. And there are maybe churches or there's daycare centers, senior centers, and we'll call them or call someone. They'll come get box and take to the seniors or take to the kids. a great thing.

Karl McCollester (21:30)
Mm.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, that's a great way to make sure everything gets used and doesn't go to waste. That's awesome.

Timothy Dargan (21:56)
Exactly,

exactly.

Mark Partin (21:57)
right.

Well, it sounds like you have a good champion in Ms. Knox, so she should be good.

Karl McCollester (21:58)
Great.

Timothy Dargan (22:02)
yes.

Yes, and Miss Myers this is her first time, will her second time coming up. I'm sure she'll get there too, she'll get there. She had the right kind of heart too, yes.

Karl McCollester (22:09)
That's right. Yeah.

Mark Partin (22:11)
That's right.

Karl McCollester (22:13)
Absolutely. So having that sponsor on council to help, you know, bring everybody else along and help drive the community as the community's elected representative, that really helps go a long way to getting the community involved too. That's great. That's great.

Timothy Dargan (22:18)
Yes.

Yes. Exactly.

Karl McCollester (22:28)
Well,

Tim, great. You know, really appreciate the time. Really, you know, again, just an awesome thing that the town has done and put together and great to learn a little bit of history about. So thank you so much for your time today.

Timothy Dargan (22:39)
You're welcome. Thank you too. I Have a great day. Okay. Okay. Bye

Mark Partin (22:39)
Yes, thank you.

Karl McCollester (22:40)
Awesome. Thanks.

Mark Partin (22:41)
Thank you. Bye bye.

Karl McCollester (22:43)
Again, we really appreciate having Tim on with us. I was really inspired by, this is a town of what?

Mark Partin (22:43)
All right.

Karl McCollester (22:52)
a few hundred people, 862. And like every town, we have these people within the community who are the achievers and the connectors, who can really be our civic, sources of civic pride.

can really help jumpstart these things as they did in Lamar. And just having that person jumpstart it, that's the hardest part is getting these kind of things started, I think, and trying to bring everybody together. And then having the town step up and help sustain it, even now past when they started it. I find it really inspiring that they were able to make that happen.

Mark Partin (23:14)
Thank

Yes, and one of the things that I was really impressed with when we were talking to Tim was the breadth of people from all kind of different areas of life in Lamar who became involved. Not only was it the municipality, the county, churches, other civic organizations, just everyone came together and really saw it as a community need that the entire community could do something about.

and not just point fingers and say somebody needs to do that. Instead, they said that somebody is us, so let's get together and do this. So that really impressed me the way they came together as a community to attack this issue.

Karl McCollester (24:12)
I hadn't realized before Tim talked about it is just, you know, leveraging your local or regional food bank to help with that. they're looking for ways that they can help distribute food more, equally across the regions that they

serve. so you don't have to stand up an entire building in a warehouse and have your own food pantry. Of course, we'll talk about that a little bit. But you don't have to go so far as to actually have a location just by having this program and working through.

the process of making sure you can reliably do this, you can get help from your regional food bank to help supply the goods, which is sometimes the hardest part to put together, especially if you're doing it at scale like this.

Mark Partin (24:58)
That's

right. And that's a good lesson, Karl because, you know, often when we think of attacking issues like this, we think we have to build an entire system, in this case, an entire distribution chain. And no, do what you can do and access other resources that are available to fill in the gap on what's missing. And in the case of Lamar, they were able to do the distribution and Harvest Hope Food Bank was able to provide the food to be distributed.

So a great partnership where everybody really capitalized on what they could do to solve the problem.

Karl McCollester (25:33)
So, yeah, and then going on to that next step of, you know, first having a food drive or a food, you know, food giveaway as Lamar is doing. If you have the facility available, let's look at different ways you can.

leverage those spaces to make it a more permanent solution or a more consistently open solution at least in the forms of a food pantry. And one of the things I had seen is

where they've partnered with the local hospital that is in their community, and that local hospital has then helped actually open up a pantry within the hospital. And of course, unfortunately, one of the places where...

a lot of our community in need ends up going because they don't have good health care either is they end up being at the hospital. having it, which is a place therefore they already know. And especially our smaller rural community hospitals, they, you know, they're struggling potentially to even use all of the space that was once built out and in the earlier times when they, the funding that they had could go further and they could do more with. So, working with your local clinic or regional

health agency. So it doesn't necessarily have to be space that's owned by the municipality, but looking at the assets within your community and thinking through, what are some places where, like the hospital or like the local health clinic, where they may have some space that's not currently in use that we could leverage to build out the space where we could have food. And that food can even be, you know, just cans and, you know, bags of beans and boxes of cereal, things that

We don't have to worry about refrigeration. You don't have to worry about spoilage. That could just be there. And then whenever that space can be open, either because of staffing or building access, then at least that space is open and available and people can know about it, especially if we help people know about it through a flyer or through the website.

Mark Partin (27:19)
Yes, and I like that you mentioned the hospital because that brings to mind that a lot of times you can look for agencies or organizations whose mission is to make quality of life better or improve health. And in the case of health care, we often think of that as helping me get well or give me treatments or give me medicine. But in many cases, it can be headed off by

improving nutrition and quality of food. So those organizations are more than happy to help provide that type of, even if it's just facility, because that contributes to better health in the community. So look broadly at some of the possible organizations you can partner with.

Karl McCollester (27:57)
Absolutely.

And then Mark, think one of the other places we had seen was here more locally in the state and working with their library.

Mark Partin (28:09)
That's right, Socastee which is located in Horry County, south end of Myrtle Beach. The Socastee library opened up a food pantry that they made available to any patrons of the community who have a need and they're able to go to the library to access the food pantry to get what they need. again, I think this is a really creative use of a community center, if you will.

Many people look to the libraries for so much more than just books and reading and multimedia opportunities, but they really are places where in some cases they can go just to be in a dry environment and a climate controlled environment if they need heat or air conditioning and encouragement because librarians are always so encouraging and helpful in so many different ways. And this just is another layer.

of a way a library, a public library is serving the community by having a food pantry available for patrons in need. And, uh, Socastee is a very densely populated area. Um, and, uh, there is, you know, in many cases, a lot of poverty in that area of the Grand Strand and Horry County. So, um, I'm glad to hear this is a need that is being addressed and met through.

Karl McCollester (29:10)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Mark Partin (29:24)
the library system there in Horry County.

Karl McCollester (29:27)
So then the one

Final thing kind of adjacent to moving in then from, we have the idea of a giveaway, then we have idea of a pantry. I think the next thing that we think about is meal access. And of course, many of our communities have some form of a Meals on Wheels program for their elderly. If not, that's something to certainly look into. those organizations do a fantastic job coordinating and getting people lined up and getting them.

meals

made and getting them out to folks.

In fact, you have folks in my neighborhood that take advantage of that Meals on Wheels program because they're on limited fixed income, and they have mobility issues, The second option from a meal access or related to that meal access is instead of Taking the meals out to the seniors for those that potentially have a little more mobility, there are towns like Black Mountain, North

Carolina who actually provide meals in a shared space. So they have a senior center that was frankly devastated by the hurricane last spring that just recently finally reopened. But that is a very vibrant part of their community where seniors go, seniors normally were doing activities with each other and they had a kitchen where that regularly provided meals to their seniors. And so again, if you have that sort of facility,

And that may be partnering with a local church or partnering with the school during the off season during the summer or finding some other facility where that sort of capability to make meals is available. And of course, you have to figure out all those things around food safety and all those other things. not just by bringing meals to the seniors, but having a place where they can come not only solve some of

the food distress, but also provides them a place for community, a place for activity, extends both the quantity potentially as well as the quality of life of your seniors and gives them a place to interact, to mingle, not feel so alone. So there's a myriad of benefits that you can have by having that central facility that's providing meals.

Mark Partin (31:10)
yeah

Yes, encouraging their emotional health is so important, even beyond their physical health. So that's a matter of benefit there. Yeah.

Karl McCollester (31:30)
Yes.

Yeah, I think

I've seen before it's one of the leading indicators of both quality and longevity of life. Right. And then finally, you if your school district doesn't already do this piece or even if they do working with them to extend it, the USDA helps school districts provide summer meal programs, as Mark mentioned right at the beginning, especially in the summertime. once

school meals are over, that can often be the primary meal for a lot of children facing, and families facing food insecurity.

decades ago that was recognized and even from the USDA level. That's why we have these summer food programs for kids. Some of our larger communities in the state, of course, do a great job with this and have food drop-off centers especially I remember around COVID, they had grocery bag giveaways basically of the week's worth of lunch meals that they would give to everybody.

as that's died down, that program is still there. And so if you have the ability, especially if have a community center or something like that, again, they're going back to those bags of, you of meals, which were mostly, you know, I think a lot of lunchable type things and some canned foods and things like that. But even that, that's a grocery bag once a week that you could do through that program. It's not costing you anything as a municipality except for the effort and the coordination.

right? maybe you can't supply, sandwiches and give them a place to eat, but you can be the conduit to provide those meals for that program through the USDA. Either directly yourself in partnership with the USDA and the state or with your local school district and partnering with them and seeing where the gaps are. Either is this something where you need to just promote and make sure people are aware and maybe even help coordinate transportation.

or is it something where, because of where the schools are located, maybe your town no longer has the local school that it once did because of consolidation. So is that something where you can help, solve a food desert situation, at least in that one instance?

Mark Partin (33:37)
Yes, and I mentioned earlier the topic of food deserts that go along with food insecurity. many of these small rural towns, as retail has centralized and grocery stores have consolidated and grown bigger, many of the small towns have lost their grocery stores.

And they're main sources of food. And because they are rural, in many cases, they don't have good public transportation, routine public transportation to be able to go to grocery stores. So there really is a food desert and no easy solution to get to a food source. So one community I'm aware of who is working on this issue itself, I don't wanna name them until they're able to work out the details.

But they're working on opening up a co-op in their town so that multiple vendors, whether they're local farmers or other types of vendors, are coming together to address a food desert issue to where no one person or one entity has to make a tremendous investment, but instead they're coming together collectively to address an issue as well as hopefully provide a solution for that community.

And that's a possibility all over, not just in the South, but all over because there are so many small communities that just don't have a source of any type of commercial business, much less food. So this is a great program and I hope it works out well for them. And if you can't picture it in your mind, think of if you've ever been to an antique mall. Most of them are basically co-ops where

Karl McCollester (35:08)
Correct.

Mm-hmm.

Mark Partin (35:21)
somebody's managing it, but then there are multiple vendors providing the different antiques for sale. This is the same concept, just with food. So it's a different way of attacking the issue and hopefully they'll be making an announcement soon.

Karl McCollester (35:35)
Nice. And Mark, I was about to talk about this next, the question just popped in my head. How would you differentiate how a co-op works versus the next topic, would be farmers markets?

Mark Partin (35:46)
The way I would differentiate the two is oftentimes farmers markets are almost event-based. And I don't mean that in a bad way, but you know, it's a Saturday morning to draw people to an area, a downtown, a park, et cetera. And very often seasonally when the food is being harvested, which is, mostly

Karl McCollester (35:53)
Mm-hmm. No, yeah, right. Sure. Yeah. Yes.

Mm-hmm.

Mark Partin (36:08)
May to September, somewhere around there, where a co-op is going to be more of a year round, more permanent commitment, probably open more than one morning or one day a week, and a more variety of foods. So not just the vegetables, but there may be a meat supplier or some canned goods or things like that. So that's how I would differentiate the two.

Karl McCollester (36:10)
Right.

Mm-hmm. Right.

in.

Yeah, yeah, no, I think that's a great way to, you know.

separate those two because I was trying to think where the great line of the thing you put it very nicely there ⁓ as far as where that goes. It makes me think more of almost the you know the markets in like Europe or Canada or something like that where like the municipality has a market hall you know which is something that like Philadelphia has. But you know we've really largely gotten away from here in the in the states but kind of bring that idea of a market hall back where you have

Mark Partin (36:38)
Yeah.

Yes.

Karl McCollester (36:58)
You have vendor spots that are continuously and hopefully even daily on weekdays or during business hours Staffed and have food for sale, you know at various spots within the the hall. So that's pretty neat But yeah, but if you can't do that then the other thing of course is I think this has been very popular At least getting the infrastructure grants I've seen a lot of them come through the municipal association of of the farmer market

Mark Partin (37:11)
Yes.

Karl McCollester (37:23)
farmers market stalls, getting those spaces set up. And the challenge of course is always that the...

the work does not end at getting the stall in place. The biggest challenge I think for that I've seen most of our small municipalities confront and the same thing of course would be true for a co-op but even more so is having the vendors there making sure they feel rewarded because you know the first probably the first four to eight weeks of having a market in place can be a very slow time because people just don't know it's there.

Mark Partin (37:33)
Yes.

Right.

Karl McCollester (37:57)
They may drive by and see it and go, what's that? But they're, you know, they're especially in, you know, if they're on a state highway going through some of our smaller towns, they're going 35 miles an hour and they don't stop, right? So there may be plenty of traffic going by, but if they don't see it and if they're not aware of it, then it's very hard for the farmer to want to come back and continue to have their wares there. you making sure not only that you're bringing in the farmer, but making sure that you're bringing in the

⁓

the population and making sure everybody's aware and makes it successful for those people. I think that, but it is important, know, to, of course, to the extent possible, you you can fairly easily, you know, some lumber, you know, take some lumber and build a shelter and some lean-tos and some tables, things like that, bring them together.

have a farmer's market and get started that way. And, you if you can then prove that you can bring the people together, then start looking at getting the grants for the more permanent structures and going from there. And to that point, we'll include the link. The South Carolina's Agriculture Department has a great

Mark Partin (38:56)
That's right, yes.

Karl McCollester (39:04)
Toolkit for setting up a farmers market and getting that started and again, that's something where as the municipality do not need to do that alone There's you know, I know there's a a group that coordinates You know local farmers with churches for instance, and they may just be one or two farmers that come on a Sunday Around worship time, you know, you already have at least you know, 30 to 300 people depending on your congregation size there so it's a great opportunity for the farmer to be able to

Mark Partin (39:25)
Yes.

Karl McCollester (39:30)
you know, have an audience that they know is going to be there on foot walking by versus driving by. And so potentially coordinating even some more of those and or going back to what we talked about at the very start here, making sure those things are documented and communicated out to your municipality, out to your population so that they know that, you know, I don't have to, you know, drive potentially, you know, 40 minutes or my only option is the Walmart or the Dollar General. I do have these options for fresh local food that, you know, I

And I've not seen a church that is not more than happy to let people who are not congregationalists go and stop by the farmer's market table that happens to be on their property that morning as well. ⁓ So just making sure that people know that they're welcome is sometimes all that needs to happen because if they see people coming out of the church and they happen to see a table there, they may not put two together, but just by letting people know, you're increasing their access.

Mark Partin (40:07)
That's right.

Karl McCollester (40:20)
and their health and nutrition.

Mark Partin (40:22)
That's right.

Karl McCollester (40:24)
So great. Anything else, Mark, that you wanted to bring up about food insecurity for today?

Mark Partin (40:29)
Only that, you know, don't give up. As we've talked about in all of these examples, there are many different ways to address the issue and you don't have to do it alone. So look around and see what opportunities are out there and do what you can. Every little bit helps.

Karl McCollester (40:46)
Yeah, and leverage your council members or your board. These are the people who are clearly already civically active enough to be willing to sacrifice their time. They're probably more of your connectors in the community. If it's something that is also important to them, it lends a lot to the energy and the chances of these things getting done.

Mark Partin (41:05)
That's right. So great topic to talk about today.

Karl McCollester (41:08)
Yep.

Yeah, absolutely. So with that, we do have, as usual, a few grants to talk about. The first one, speaking of farmers market, the USDA has a program to help you promote farmers markets. is a now it is a larger grant, 50,000 to 500,000. It does have a 25 percent match, though. So, you know, gear that accordingly with your budget about what you think you could put towards that. But if you have a farmers market that you're just trying to get going,

And especially if you can pair that potentially with a grant from the municipal association that we may that we'll talk about here at the end. Then it's a great way to hopefully maybe jumpstart and make sure people are aware of what's happening with the farmers market that you're already have in place or trying to get started up. And that is due on June 6th.

Mark Partin (41:57)
Yes, and there is another one also from the US Department of Agriculture that is called the Community Facilities Direct Loan and Grant Program. And this one is geared more towards building community facilities, not directly just for farmers markets or food facilities, but community facilities that could host something like a farmers market.

This is specifically targeted towards communities that are less than 20,000 people. So if you are a smaller community, then this may be a better option for you to go after this funding. it's in the form of either loans or grants, could be either one. And it is on a graded system, so I encourage you to look at the details of the grant to see.

You know, make sure you can score as high as possible to be eligible for either the loan or the grant in this case to develop your facility itself. And again, it can be used for more than just a farmer's market.

Karl McCollester (42:59)
Yeah, absolutely. And just to put the bug in everybody's ear, you know, that when he says more than farmers market, that could even be improving your town hall. That could be setting up a library annex. That could be even, you know, working to partner to set up a new health care facility in town or transitional. You know, they layless child care centers and even fairgrounds. So this is pretty much any type of infrastructure that would be community related

So we definitely encourage you to check that out. And then finally, they have not released the date, at least as of when I last looked at these notes, which may have since that was before I went on vacation, they may have released it now. But the South Carolina Municipal Association they have that annual municipal impact grant program. And that is one that I've seen a number of communities use for Farmer's Market facilities. They did redo the criteria. I think

two years ago now to try to make sure they try to mix it up with more innovative things as things are going along because I think a lot of people did use it for some for farmers market facilities. But it is you know it is a grant I don't think it has any matching and that due date should be coming up shortly because they normally announce that at the municipal association annually.

Mark Partin (44:02)
Yes.

Karl McCollester (44:13)
about who the winners are. So definitely keep a lookout on the Municipal Association site for that.

Mark Partin (44:19)
Yes, so.

keep your eyes open, we'll continue to share grants with you and hopefully you can learn some information that you're able to put into action in your community.

Karl McCollester (44:30)
Yes, hopefully. That's why we love doing this and sharing some things, both that we've happened to see and learn in our times working in and with municipal government, as well as then that and seeing what else we can learn from the examples we've seen from others. So with that, thank you so much for your time, Mark. Great, as always, hanging out with you on a Friday afternoon. And look forward to talking with on a new topic next time.

Mark Partin (44:49)
Yes.

Look forward to it and thank you all for listening.

Karl McCollester (44:54)
Yes,

please. Thank you all again. As always, like and subscribe and do all those podcasting things that we're supposed to ask you to do. Bye.

Mark Partin (45:03)
Bye bye.