Page 66 - BusinessWest November 9, 2020

A+ Awards Show
Nov. 12: The Amherst Area Chamber of Commerce 2020 A+ Awards Show will be held virtually and broadcast live from Hadley Farms Meeting House, with PeoplesBank serving as presenting sponsor. Each year, the chamber gives A+ Awards to individu- als and organizations that enrich the life of the com- munity through their work in education, business, and civic engagement in Amherst, Belchertown, Hadley, Leverett, Pelham, Shutesbury, Sunderland, and the Pioneer Valley as a whole. This year’s honor- ees include Betsey McInnis (Lifetime Achievement Award), Phoenix Fruit Farm of Belchertown (Leader
Agenda
in Innovation Award), Kestrel Land Trust of Amherst (Leader in Sustainability Award), Ash Crawford, director of Operations at Amherst Coffee (Young Professional Award), Mercedes-Benz of Spring-
field (Community Service Award), and Lisa Eugin
of Encharter Insurance (Chamber MVP). New this year is the COVID Hero, a nonprofit or individual who provided essential support services, went above and beyond, and took initiative to put others before self to benefit the greater good. Live voting will take place to choose a winner from the following orga- nizations and individuals: Amherst Survival Center, Arizona Pizza, Bistro 63, Mary Beth Ogulewicz of the Amherst Senior Center, Rebekah Demling of ARPS PGO, and Wheelhouse Catering. Also new this year, David Jeffway, owner of Sharper Vision, will create video tributes for each awardee. A virtual access pass to the view the live awards show costs $20, or a $50 VIP package includes the virtual access pass, a
$25 Amherst-area gift certificate, a hard copy of the 2020 A+ Awards Journal, and sponsor gifts. Registra- tion is open, and A+ Award dinner sponsorships and ads are still available for the virtual extravaganza; for more information, visit amherstarea.com. E-mail Pazmany at [email protected] with any inquiries.
Bright Nights at Forest Park
Nov. 25 to Jan. 3: Bright Nights at Forest Park will take place this year. Spirit of Springfield and the
city of Springfield have developed protocols to pro- vide a safe and festive event that has been a holiday tradition since 1995. They will be instituted during setup, breakdown, and during the event, and include masks, regular cleaning, online ticketing, and more. Restrooms will be for emergency use only, and the usual bustling gift shop, amusement rides, horse- drawn wagon and carriage rides, and visits and sup- per with Santa will not be available. This will help keep all visitors safe and socially distanced in their vehicles during the experience. Bright Nights at For- est Park is three miles of a unique holiday experi- ence featuring more than 675,000 lights and iconic displays like Seuss Land, Everett Barney Mansion, Toy Land, Happy Holidays, Springfield, and so many more. It generates $15 million in economic impact annually and has created a lifetime of family memo- ries in its 25-year history. It also promises to be one of the safest events, with families contained in their cars. Admission will be $23 per car weeknights, weekdays, and holidays. Discounted tickets will be available at participating Big Y World Class Markets for $16.50. Due to bus-capacity limitations in Mas- sachusetts, admission for buses has been reduced to $100 for buses with capacity of more than 30 people. Vehicles with seating from 17 to 30 people will be
charged $50 for admission.
Healthcare Heroes
Nov. 18: Since the phrase COVID-19 came into our lexicon, those working in the broad healthcare field have emerged as the true heroes during a pandemic that has changed every facet of life as we know it. BusinessWest and its sister publication, the Health- care News, will pay tribute in their own way, by dedicating their annual Healthcare Heroes program in 2020 to those who have emerged as true heroes during this crisis. The gala celebrating the winners will be held from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. at the Sheraton Springfield Monarch Place Hotel in two separate events because of state restrictions on crowd size. The first event will honor the staff at Holyoke Medi- cal Center; Christopher Savino, Emeline Bean, and Lydia Brisson, clinical liaisons for Berkshire Health- care Systems; Rabbi Devorah Jacobson, director of Spiritual Life at JGS Lifecare; the Nutrition Depart- ment at Greater Springfield Senior Services Inc.; and Friends of the Homeless. The second cohort includes Mark Keroack, president and CEO of Bay- state Health; the Institute for Applied Life Sciences at UMass Amherst; Maggie Eboso, Infection Control and Prevention coordinator at Mercy Medical Cen- ter; Jennifer Graham, home health aide at O’Connell Care at Home; and Helen Gobeil, staffing supervisor at Visiting Angels West Springfield. Tickets cost $90 per person. To make a reservation, contact Jenni-
fer Godaire at (413) 781-8600, ext. 100, or godaire@ businesswest.com. The Healthcare Heroes program is sponsored by Elms College (presenting sponsor), Baystate Health and Health New England (present- ing sponsor), and partner sponsors Bulkley Richard- son, Comcast Business, and Trinity Health New Eng- land/Mercy Medical Center.
Food Bank
Continued from page 9
ing America’s COVID-19 Response Fund.
“The federal government has stepped up — we’ve received consider- ably more federal food,” he explained, referring specifically to CARES Act appropriations that enable such agen- cies to buy more food. “And there was an outpouring of support from individ- uals, businesses, and regional and state foundations, as well as from Feeding America, the national network of food banks.”
The agency has also received more than $400,000, with another $123,000 coming, from the Massachusetts COVID Relief Fund, he went on, adding that a number of individual businesses, including Big Y and the Antonocci Family Foundation, have made sizable donations as well.
Part of the federal government’s response has come in the form of Farmers to Families Food Boxes, a new program through which the USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service is part- nering with national, regional, and local distributors, whose workforces have been significantly impacted by the closure of restaurants, hotels, and other food-service businesses, to pur- chase up to $4.5 billion in fresh pro- duce, dairy, and meat products from American producers of all sizes.
This program supplies boxes of
fresh fruits and vegetables, dairy prod- ucts, and meat products, which distrib- utors package into family-sized boxes, then transport them to food banks, community and faith-based organi- zations, and other nonprofits serving Americans in need.
The program has benefited several area farms, said Morehouse, noting that those supplying the boxes are purchasing products from many area farmers who were severely impacted by their inability to sell to restaurants, colleges, and universities closed by the pandemic.
“It took a while for some of these farms to adapt, but many of them have,” he said, citing, as one example, Mapleline Farm in Hadley, a dairy farm whose name and logo were on count- less boxes of quart containers of milk in the Food Bank’s warehouse.
As for the future, Morehouse said the contributions that have poured in from individuals and businesses have left the organization in a solid position financially for this current fiscal year, one in which overall need is expected to continue growing, while the econo- my is projected to continue struggling.
Meanwhile, question marks remain about the ongoing level of support from state and federal governments, as well as from individual contributors, he said, citing the potential for donor fatigue as the pandemic wears on.
“The state is operating on a month- to-month budget, so we’re not even sure if we’re going to be level-funded for a program that we’ve come to rely on for 30% of our food since 1992,”
he told BusinessWest. “And the federal government has not passed another stimulus package, so we’re anticipating a decline in federal support.
“We have a jigsaw puzzle of public and private emergency food resources that rely of federal and state funding and private charitable support,” he went on. “We rely on all those sources of support to get the food we need and the resources we need to keep opera- tions afloat.”
One of the important pieces of that puzzle is Monte’s March, the fundrais- ing walk from Springfield to Greenfield that was launched by radio personality Monte Belmonte to benefit the Food Bank. Belmonte has seen the ranks
of people joining him on his late- November trek grow steadily over the years, as well as the amount raised for the agency, but that first trend won’t continue this year, as the pandemic is forcing organizers to encourage indi- viduals to support the march remotely — although the top-performing teams when it comes to generating donations will be able to march.
But, given the urgent need for sup- port, they are hoping the second trend will continue. The goal for this year has
been raised from the $333,000 mark set last year — each dollar donated buys three meals, so the goal was to fund 1 million meals — to $365,000, or $1,000 a day, or 4,000 meals a day (one dollar now buys four meals, due to greater efficiency).
Hard to Digest
Looking at the projections from Feeding America for the next several months, the ones predicting that one in six area residents will be food-insecure, Morehouse had his doubts initially about whether things would really get that bad here.
But now, he’s thinking they may be realistic — painfully realistic, to be more precise — especially when one ponders the unanswerable questions concerning when the pandemic will subside and to what degree the fed- eral government will keep on printing money.
One thing Morehouse does know
is that the Food Bank will continue to pivot and respond proactively to the ongoing crisis — right down to finding more warehouse space. u
George O’Brien can be reached at [email protected]
30 NOVEMBER 9, 2020
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