Volunteer

Volunteers are essential at all levels of the Food Bank For New York City's operations — from serving hot meals to New Yorkers in need at the Community Kitchen in Harlem to staffing at public awareness and fundraising events!

Learn how to get involved below! Opportunities are available for individuals and groups.

Warehouse Repack Program Community Kitchen & Food Pantry of West Harlem

CookShop Program Tax Assistance Program Your Neighborhood Food Program

Adopt a Food Program Events & Campaigns

WAREHOUSE REPACK PROGRAM
Volunteers are needed at our 90,000 square-foot warehouse in Hunts Point, Bronx, to break down, assess the quality of and repackage food and nonfood products into sizes suitable for distribution to the city's soup kitchens and food pantries. Last year, volunteers donated close to 14,000 hours,  repacking food that helped supply more than 900,000 meals for hungry New Yorkers. In addition, these volunteer efforts helped the Food Bank save more than $200,000. Our Warehouse Repack Program typically accepts groups of 10 to 30 volunteers from corporations, schools, nonprofits and other organizations. Volunteers are needed between 9:30am and 3:30pm, Mondays through Fridays. Most groups help for a two to three hour shift. VOLUNTEER

COMMUNITY KITCHEN & FOOD PANTRY OF WEST HARLEM
The Community Kitchen & Food Pantry of West Harlem, located on 116 Street, offers low-income New Yorkers a broad range of interrelated programs to alleviate hunger, including a soup kitchen that serves hot meals, a choice-style food pantry and a Meals-on-Heels meal-delivery program. Volunteer opportunities are also available at other food programs throughout New York City. Learn more about these programs below or contact us now to find out which program best suits your interests and availability.

Our Soup Kitchen needs volunteers to help prepare food Mondays through Fridays any time between 10:30am and 3:30pm, and to serve dinner from 4 to 6:30pm. Individual volunteers or small groups of up to six people are welcome. VOLUNTEER

Our choice-style Food Pantry allows eligible New Yorkers to select the fresh produce and packaged, frozen and canned food items they need themselves, free of charge, in a supermarket-style environment. Volunteers are needed Mondays and Wednesdays 9am–1pm and Fridays 3–5pm to help stock pantry shelves, and Tuesdays and Thursdays 9am–4pm to help clients shop, check out, assist with bagging groceries and re-stock shelves. Spanish and Chinese speakers are encouraged to volunteer. Individual volunteers or small groups of up to six people are welcome. VOLUNTEER

COOKSHOP PROGRAM
The Food Bank provides nutrition-education curriculums for people age 5 to 95 in schools, after-school programs and community-based organizations citywide through our CookShop Program. The program sites are located in New York City's low-income neighborhoods where the incidence of diet-related diseases, such as diabetes and obesity, tends to be higher. The program includes two main components, both of which have a need for volunteer assistance:

CookShop for Adults invites culinary and nutrition students and professionals and food enthusiasts to volunteer at hands-on, nutrition-education workshops that teach participants how to purchase, store, cook and enjoy fresh vegetables in season. Volunteers are needed to assist leaders in structuring and leading workshops that occur on weekdays between the hours of 8:30am and 8pm throughout the five boroughs. Bilingual speakers that have skills with Spanish, Asian languages and African languages are encouraged to volunteer. Depending on their background, volunteers have also assisted in areas including cooking instruction and nutrition education, so let us know any special skills you have! Volunteers are asked to commit 2–3 hours once a month for a 12-month period and are required to attend a 3.5-hour training at the Food Bank's downtown Manhattan office at 39 Broadway. APPLY TODAY

CookShop Classroom is a school-based food and nutrition-education program designed to encourage children to eat more wholesome foods, especially vegetables, whole grains, legumes and fruit. The curriculum materials, which are designed for pre-k to second grade, focus on classroom cooking experiences and allow children to explore how plants grow and where food comes from. Volunteers are needed to assist teachers in structuring and leading workshops that are held once a week between the hours of 9:30am and 3pm for the spring semester (January–May) in schools throughout the five boroughs. Depending on their background, volunteers have also assisted in areas including cooking instruction and nutrition education, so let us know any special skills you have! Volunteers are required to attend a four-hour training at the Food Bank's downtown Manhattan office at 39 Broadway. APPLY TODAY

TAX ASSISTANCE PROGRAM
The Food Bank's Tax Assistance Program offers low- to moderate-income New Yorkers help filing their taxes. Every year, 200 to 300 volunteer tax preparers donate their time through the program to help eligible New Yorkers receive credits and refunds including the Earned Income Tax Credit. Annually, our Tax Assistance Program has completed up to 50,000 tax returns for low- to moderate-income New Yorkers — helping to provide as much as $100 million in tax refunds.

The Food Bank is currently recruiting volunteers for the 2011 tax season. New volunteers must complete a training course consisting of an online self-study program published by the IRS called "Link&Learn" and one-day, weekend classroom training. Volunteers then set their own schedule for volunteering at one of our many Tax Assistance sites: located in Harlem and Washington Heights in Manhattan, Brooklyn, the Bronx and in Queens. Volunteers are required to donate at least 35 hours of their time from late-January through mid-April, approximately 3 to 4 hours per week. Upon completion of the program, all volunteers will receive a certificate from the IRS recognizing their contribution. VOLUNTEER

Learn more about the Tax Assistance Program. 

YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD FOOD PROGRAM
Food Bank For New York City distributes food to more than 1,000 food assistance programs — including soup kitchens, food pantries, senior centers and shelters — throughout the five boroughs. The majority of these programs rely on volunteers to operate, supplying food and other assistance to low-income New Yorkers. To volunteer at your neighborhood food program, please fill out our volunteer application toady, or use our Food Program Locator to locate a program near you.

ADOPT A FOOD PROGRAM
Adopt a Food Program, an initiative of Food Bank For New York City in partnership with NYC Service, pairs interested volunteers and volunteer groups with food pantries and soup kitchens throughout the five boroughs to better serve New Yorkers who struggle to put food on the table. Through a matching process based on skills, interests, availability and need, volunteers "adopt a food program" by committing to long-term collaborations — enhancing the food program's ability to improve the lives of the New Yorkers who rely on them for food. Volunteers will have the opportunity to work side-by-side with those on the front lines of the fight against hunger in New York City, while food programs will be able to engage the considerable skills and talents of willing volunteers to fulfill unmet organizational needs. VOLUNTEER AS AN INDIVIDUAL OR A GROUP

If you are a food assitance program looking to participate in the Adopt a Food Program, click here.

EVENTS & CAMPAIGNS
From delivering campaign materials to restaurants and supermarkets in your neighborhood to conducting research interviews or distributing gift bags at events, volunteers are essential to the Food Bank's year-round public awareness, research and fundraising efforts. The Food Bank keeps costs low by using volunteers for the "soup-to-nuts" aspects of events, including staffing and invitation distribution — allowing the Food Bank to maintain one of the most efficient business models in the nation's food bank network. Our education and outreach efforts utilize volunteers to conduct interviews for research studies, coordinate Borough Hunger Task Force meetings in communities throughout the city and build relationships with the hospitality industry.

Check back soon for new event and campaign volunteer opportunities. Contact the Food Bank if you have questions about any volunteer opportunities.