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Angelina Persaud, Senior Writer

Manhattan University’s Gourmet Dining along with Campus Ministry and Social Action (CMSA) have partnered with Friendly Fridge BX to address food insecurity in Riverdale and spread the Lasallian mission of serving the community. 

Friendly Fridge was originally founded on May 21, 2020 with the mission to “normalize reducing environmental waste and harm while also reducing the stress of many. We accomplish this by developing and strengthening partnerships within our community to redirect good food from the landfills and instead, sharing this food with anyone who may need a little extra help,” according to the organization’s website. 

To date, the Fridge has partnered with more than 25 universities and local businesses to create a pipeline of 65,000 pounds of food to those in need. 

Additionally, the mission of Friendly Fridge BX is to evaluate food waste’s “impact on the environment around us and the power it holds to alleviate hunger for so many. The Friendly Fridge BX is all about community-based solutions,” according to the Fridge’s website. 

The partnership initially started from the efforts of Christopher Fidanza, a sophomore baseball player at MU. He was seeking a way to collaborate with Gourmet Dining to donate leftover food items and consumables to the Friendly Fridge, so that they could be distributed to people in need.

Fidanza eventually contacted CMSA to find a more direct approach to spreading the word about Friendly Fridge’s mission and how to encourage students to volunteer their time and efforts. 

Once the partnership was underway, one question that remained was where the food items would be collected for pick-up by Friendly Fridge volunteers. It was soon determined that Zaro’s Bakery in Thomas Hall would be the distribution center and pick-up location for food donations. 

Rev. Robert Joerger, C.P., and Rev. Edward Beck, C.P, co-directors of CMSA, spoke to The Quadrangle about the initiative and how it is currently operating from Zaro’s Bakery, which is also making donations of their own pastries to the Friendly Fridge. 

“They’ve committed Monday to Friday at 2 p.m. when they close, everything that’s remaining, not only from their daily baked goods, but anything that’s remaining at the concession or anything expiring that we can have students bring it down to Friendly Fridge and donate it,” Beck said. 

“The university’s Gourmet Dining and Zaro’s Bakery have been extremely generous,” Joerger said. “We were expecting that we’ll send a student down there after they close up and there’ll be a couple of sandwiches and a couple of buns. We need to send two to three to four people a day down there to bring the food and pastries to the Fridge.” 

Joerger and Beck emphasized the campus’ proximity to people in need in the community and how students do not have to look far to find ways to give back to those in need. They also noted that giving back to the community is a highlight of MU’s Lasallian mission, which students can directly have an impact on by volunteering. 

“It fits with the Lasallian mission, because the vision of that is that you do serve the poor and the needy, and that service is part of the hallmarks of being Lasallian,” Beck said. “So, if we can engage students, it makes a connection. There’s no better way to model the Lasallian mission than actually to jump in and do it.” 

“You don’t have to go far to find the hungry,” Joerger said. “They’re right down the block or in the [Waldo] sanctuary, you don’t have to go far to find people in need. I think that’s an important piece of it, that these really are our neighbors.”

The primary concern facing the partnership is staffing the food delivery with consistent volunteers. Currently, MU has agreed to be the primary deliverers to bring the donations down to the Friendly Fridge. 

Beck explained that one way they tried to increase staffing is by requiring students who participated in the L.O.V.E. trips to complete 25 service hours. 

“We’re assigning them with the Friendly Fridge for pick-up and sometimes line work as part of their service,” Beck said. “I’m having trouble just staffing that right now. It’s hard to do further outreach, because you need students to respond. I put an announcement out saying this was happening, and from that announcement, we only got one student volunteer from the whole university.” 

Joerger and Beck stated that their main goal is to find ways to unite the student body using service projects such as this. Yet, retaining student engagement has been easier said than done. 

Joerger emphasized that one of the main challenges to uniting the student body is to find a common schedule time between residents and commuter students to ensure everyone has a chance to participate. 

“You have a large population of commuter students, so you go to school, you do what you need to do, you go home, which is a different kind of involvement than students who actually live here,” Joerger said. “So, to bring those two communities together, and also to be able to speak to both, and have a schedule that’s inclusive of both is hard at times.” 

“To build community is one of our primary tasks, and part of that is working together and doing projects together, and doing service together, having religious services together and spiritual events together,” Beck said. 

Beck shared the most inspiring part of seeing the partnership come to fruition and the dedication of the few student volunteers who have been helping so far. Primarily, they noted that the MU community doesn’t shy away from the opportunity to do service. 

“The most inspiring part is to see the generosity and see the willingness of some students to recognize a need,” Beck said. “We’ve had students come to us out of the blue who were never really part of religious service, never part of campus ministry, and just say, ‘I’d like to do some service.’ And I said, ‘Do you have to do service hours? Or is it something for a class?’ They said, ‘No, I just want to do this.’ So that kind of generosity is inspiring, because you could be doing anything else.” 

Joerger shared an anecdote that he connects to feeding the poor. He explained that a religious brother had once told him one of the most effective ways to cope with anxiety and worries about the world around you is to feed the poor and be present in the moment. 

“I think students think about the future, the climate, all of that and it’s a lot of anxiety, how do you process it?,” Joerger said. “How do you deal with your feelings? And I remember an old brother said, ‘When you have those doubts and when you have those feelings, the best thing to do is go and feed the poor.’ You can’t solve this, but you can help feed somebody.” 

Joerger also noted that the importance of initiatives such as this is to create a sense of community and normalcy for those who are disadvantaged by reminding them they are valued as people. 

“There’s a line of people who are hungry,” Joerger said. “You see the little children. Most of us were fed as children, then you see these parents trying to find food to feed their kids. You know when I look at you, you are a person to me, and I am a person to you.” 

CMSA and Gourmet Dining welcome student volunteers to assist with delivery and pick-up of the food donations from Zaro’s Bakery Monday through Friday at 2 p.m. in Thomas Hall.