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- April 18, 2024
MCMF launched its food pantry program in October 2012. The food pantry provides shelf-stable food and fresh groceries to low-income residents of Montgomery County, serving the most vulnerable, handicapped, disabled, and critically ill residents. In 2019 food pantry distributed 34,510 pounds of food, in 2020 distributed 121,490, and in 2021 distributed 242,490 pounds of food.
Key features of the MCMF Food Pantry are:
Residents of Montgomery County who are in need of food are advised to contact MCMF at mcmfmd@gmail.com and (301) 825-3657.
Every year MCMF food pantry distributes Ramadan baskets to the needy in the month of Ramadan, This year Ramadan basket distribution will be held on April 10, 2022 and April 11, 2022. In 2019 MCMF served 9100 pounds of food, in 2020 served 17,920 pounds of food and in 2021 served over 120,000 pounds of food to needy families in Ramadan in Prince Georges, Baltimore, and Montgomery County. Food packages contained rice, pasta, oil, dates, bread, sugar, tea, onions, dry lentils, and other non-perishable goods.
School Feeding Project
MCMF School feeding project was started in March 2020 during the onset of COVID 19 pandemic when businesses shut down, people laid off, schools closed down and families of children in public schools left hungry and with extreme food insecurity. MCMF collaborated with MCPS to provide food to these COVID 19 impacted families serving predominantly low-income African American and Hispanic neighborhoods. The project has as yet distributed 33,320 lbs of food to over 1000 families in MCPS school districts. This included 12,000 lbs of non-perishable food and 2,500 lbs of fresh produce to Green Castle Elementary School; 8,000 lbs of non-perishable food, 2,500 lbs of fresh produce, and 200 dozen eggs to the Takoma Park Middle School cluster; and 900 lbs of food, including bread, eggs and fresh milk to Gaithersburg Elementary School. Every week as the demand of food increases we add new schools to our network.
Food Assistance Program for Churches, City of Gaithersburg, Frontline Workers and Nonprofits
MCMF partners with area churches and nonprofits to feed the hungry. This year we partnered with Educare, Adventist Social Services, Pentecostal Church, Hughs Church and distributed over 10,000 lbs of food and 2610 meals to low-income Montgomery County residents living in Silver Spring, Takoma Park and Rockville. MCMF also partnered with the City of Gaithersburg and served 315 meals to the shelterless in Montgomery County and 200 meals to the police and front line workers in Gaithersburg and Germantown.
Zabiha Program:
MCMF organizes a very effective and efficient program of handling all logistics and work relating to “Qurbani” at the time of Eid-ul-Adha commemorating Prophet Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice his son in obedience to God’s command. Thereby, MCMF provides to all Muslims an avenue to fulfill this religious obligation through it with an assurance that meat will reach the deserving candidates.
In 2020, MCMF distributed over 6000 lbs of meat to the needy in partnership with Impact Silverspring, Adventist Social services, Baltimore Mosque, and several other non-profit and faith based organizations. The average cost of a single share of “Qurbani” was $250 including cutting, packing.
For the last several years, MCMF has participated in a Feed the Homeless Program run by the Interfaith Works Women Center of Rockville that provides temporary shelter to women and then helps them to lift themselves from poverty and hopelessness through prevention, stabilization and empowerment programs.
MCMF has been serving breakfast, lunch and dinner for 28 days for 36 residents. Residents are served with dinners of different ethnic varieties and served by MCMF volunteers. On average, it costs MCMF approximately $13.5 per head per day for feeding the residents of the Center. In addition on an average 4-6 volunteers work for 3 hours on each of these 28 days. This program is handled by Dr. Shanavas, member of the board of Directors. This year the program served 1020 meals at the Shelter.
Food Drive
For the last several years, MCMF in coordination with Manna Food and the local Giant stores has undertaken an annual food collection campaign on designated dates. On those dates, MCMF volunteers stand on the doorsteps of selected Giant stores to collect nonperishable food items that are handed over to Manna Food for distribution among the needy families. It may be recalled that Manna Food is a well-established and highly reputed non-profit organization of the area striving to eliminate hunger in Montgomery County.
Last year, MCMF conducted annual food drive for two days in April 2019. Sixty volunteers devoted about 1000 volunteer hours for the food drive at 13 Giant stores and collected about 11,000 pounds of nonperishable food items. This event attracts middle and high school students and their parents as MCMF is recognized by the County school system as a legitimate non-profit organization for earning SLL Hours. Those children who want to participate in this noble effort and also earn SLL Hours to meet the graduation requirement are urged to register themselves with MCMF.
During the current year 2020 we had planned the Food Drive during April / May 2020, but the program had to be canceled due to Covid19 crisis situation.
Christmas and Thanks Giving Gift Basket Distributions
Christmas and Thanks-giving are the occasions to remember and help those who are less fortunate in our community. MCMF has recognized the importance of such occasions since its inception and distributes Thanksgiving and Christmas dinner baskets in collaboration with the Montgomery County Holiday gift basket program. Each year MCMF serves traditional Turkey dinners to 120 to 150 families each year since 2009. MCMF also distributes toys and Christmas gifts to families in need.
MCMF conducts annual summer and winter coat drives. The Summer drive is held during the month of Ramadan and MCMF distributes over 1000 items at the Muslim Community Center located in Silver Spring. MCMF also carries in its office shelves of gently used clothes donated by the community throughout the year. Any needy person can visit the office and take away useable clothes at no cost. In addition,
The community members who want to donate gently used clothes or those who wish to visit the office to examine the existing stock for making selections for their use should get in touch with the MCMF office by phone or email. MCMF can arrange to pick up the clothes from any office or residence if sufficient quantity is available for donation.
With the influx of a large number of refugees, particularly from Afghanistan, Syria, Sudan and Iraq, who took up residency in the County neighborhood, MCMF has got a lot of requests for assistance both from the affected families and the County government. The requirements included food, clothing, furniture, transportation, housing and job placements. With limited funds at the disposal of MCMF, it adopted a dual approach of soliciting help from the community for this specific project and prioritizing the areas in which we could help.
With generous cash and kind donations of the community, MCMF has been able to provide, food, used and new clothing, blankets and household items. In addition, rent assistance has been provided to those who were facing eviction. Our major effort has been to help the able bodied individuals to find a job and to purchase and provide cars to them for their mobility. So far, MCMF has provided 40 cars to the refugee families and helped a number of them to get a paying job. We also provided assistance to 62 families to buy school uniform for their children. MCMF is also exploring the prospects of arranging English classes for the family members and provide vocational training to the females to become productive members of the family.
The community can help in meeting the refugee requests by contributing generously through cash and in kind donations.
As an integral part of its humanitarian and social welfare programs, MCMF arranges social events and get together functions for various purposes. in the month of Ramadan, it arranges in coordination with the Montgomery County Muslim Council and the office of the County Executive, an Iftar dinner which is attended by representatives of all faiths, nonprofit organizations and County and State governments.
Accordingly, an interfaith Iftar dinner was arranged on May 29, 2019 which was attended by 450 guests. The cost of the event was equally shared by MCMF and Montgomery County Muslim Council( MCMC).
Mr. Mark Elrich, the County Executive, was the chief guest and he also addressed the audience. The County Executive and County President declared May 5, 2019 to June 4, 2019 as Muslim American Ramadan month. A citation from the Governor of Maryland was also read out at the function by his representative.
The community members who show interest in the activities of MCMF and MCMC and their families were invited to attend free of cost. In addition, the guests included representatives of other faiths, County and State Officials and political leaders of the region.