Queens Together: March 2021 Highlights
The following was submitted by Jonathan Forgash, Executive Director, Queens Together.
Good day.
March 2021 marked our first anniversary of restaurant support and community service in Queens, New York.
Let’s take a moment to acknowledge to brutal year it’s been for so many. We all have lost family, friends, neighbors and co-workers to COVID19. Many have lost jobs, homes and faced other losses. Queens Together wishes you all a better year in 2021.
We offer a heartfelt thank you to our 1500-plus donors, volunteers, partner organizations, sponsors, food pantries and community groups for helping Queens Together fill a void by building bridges that connected local restaurants with advocacy, income opportunities, and food relief efforts in their communities. Most importantly, this work was crucial in assisting thousands of people confronting food and economic insecurity. The project was wrapped in a short period of time with the following results:
We launched the first independent restaurant association in Queens, New York. The goal is to assist our unique borough wide community of restaurant owners and employees with advocacy, education, technical/marketing assistance and a food relief network to support communities in crises.
We funded and facilitated restaurants in preparing over 50,000 meals and tons of fresh groceries to neighbors in Queens.
We created an Astoria food pantry with the Variety Boys and Girls Club and a network of food pantries across the borough that at its height distributed USDA produce to approximately 7,000 people per week May 2020 to October 2020.
We sponsored events connecting restaurants and food pantries that gained the restaurants money and much needed press coverage while helping groups across the borough.
We published a series of food and culture guides celebrating restaurants and their neighborhoods that helped market these businesses at a critical time.
Thank you all for your support. I look forward to continuing this work with you in 2021 and the years ahead.
Highlights
March 9: Grassroots groups from Queens teamed up to provide close to 400 boxes of groceries to residents and they are planning dozens of food pantry pop-up sites for the next few months. A weekly pop-up food pantry at Crosson Park in the heart of Woodside fed hundreds of families. It’s a partnership of two groups, GPK Foundation America and Queens Together.
March 16: Queens Together and the Dominico-American Society of Queens (DASQ) joined forces with El Gauchito and La Pequeña Colombia restaurants to serve warm meals and distribute USDA food boxes to 100 families in Corona on March 16.
March 23: Queens nonprofits raise funds to hire local restaurants to feed NYCHA residents in need. The food distribution was a collaboration between two nonprofits: Queens Together and the Riis Settlement House. They raised money to pay local restaurants’ Dino’s Pizzeria and Ornella Trattoria to feed hundreds of families.
March 24: Queens Center for Progress (QCP), the Jamaica-based provider of supports and services for people with developmental disabilities, will host its annual “An Evening of Fine Dining” fundraising gala on Wednesday, March 24. Usually held at Terrace on the Park, this year’s festivities will take place on Zoom due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Jonathan Forgash from the grass roots restaurant advocacy group Queens Together shares the You’re Awesome Award with Mark Boccia Sr. and Mark Boccia Jr.