Second Harvest Heartland

“The form 990 is prepared by our auditor with support from staff at second harvest heartland. The finance committee of the board reviews and approves the form 990 which is then provided to all board members prior to filing.”

“Upon hiring, employees are provided a copy of the conflict of interest policy. Human resources retains a signed copy from each employee stating they understood and accepted the terms of the policy. Members of the board are required to provide a signed agreement annually.”

“Shh periodically uses external surveys to evaluate all employees' compensation. Shh also uses other compensation sources as well as considering the cost-of-living adjustment per the federal social security administration guidelines, the consumer price index, and wage and salary trend reports to determine an appropriate average annual percentage. An average increase based on second harvest heartland's financials is approved for budgeting purposes. Employees are given a performance appraisal and a recommendation of an increase (if merited) is made to the executive team.”

“Copies of all information are available upon request. Form 990 is made available through the organization's website.”

“At second harvest heartland, we work to end hunger together. As one of the largest, most efficient, and most innovative hunger-relief organizations in the nation, we leverage our unique position in the emergency food chain to make an impact. Through partnerships, we support those in our region facing hunger today. More than a food bank, we're a leading partner in the policies and programs that work to end hunger, like snap, school meals and senior nutrition programs, and we're an innovator in the areas where food can be the solution, like foodrx and minnesota central kitchen. In fiscal year 2021, our work provided more than 107 million meals. We worked to support the 1 in 12 minnesotans, including 1 in 8 minnesota kids, who faced hunger last year, placing intentional effort on addressing the racial hunger divide, or the fact that black and hispanic households experienced food insecurity at least twice the rate of white, non-hispanic households. We reached those experiencing hunger through both food bank operations and hunger-fighting programs: as a food bank, we work with 388 agency partners and nearly 1,000 active programs in 41 counties in minnesota and 18 counties in western wisconsin to get food to neighbors facing hunger. Last year we provided, on average, 86.1% of all food distributed by food shelf partners to their neighbors. Of the more than 120 million pounds of food we distributed last year, more than 62% was fresh food (produce, meat, dairy and bakery items). Our agency relations team helped ease pandemic-era pressures for our partners by making $455,000 in grants available to help partners adjust to their local needs, absorbing increased costs and cancelling shared maintenance fees, and assisting in the development of crisis response and preparedness plans. In collaboration with agency and community partners, we executed 329 emergency grocery distributions in response to covid and the twin cities uprisings. Our volunteer base is critical to our operations. Last year, 5,315 unique volunteers donated time to second harvest heartland from food sorting and packing to client assistance to skill-based volunteer projects and more contributing 52,405 total hours. Volunteers donated the time equivalent to 25 full-time employees, based on the average hours per year worked by a full-time employee: 2,080. Minnesota central kitchen, our prepared meals initiative, provided 1,049,910 fully prepared meals at locations across the region, in partnership with more than 50 community organizations who distributed the meals where they were needed most. On average more than 60% of the ingredients in each meal were sourced by second harvest heartland. 17 kitchens participated in the collaborative, employing around 100 food service workers weekly. Foodrx, our medically tailored nutrition box program, provided services to support a healthy diet and improved health of 8,823 individuals through four service categories: foodrx chronic disease management program (1,175), foodrx stability boxes (891), snap referrals (4,668), community resources (2,089). Participation in the foodrx chronic program is up over 300% from the previous fiscal year. Our snap (supplemental nutrition assistance program) outreach specialists processed over 13,200 new client referrals and assisted over 8,800 households with snap applications and re-certifications. This added over 6 million meals to families last year. Our child nutrition programs provided over $446,000 in grants to 24 education and nonprofit partners to help meet increased need and address food access challenges due to covid-19. These grants supported the delivery of over 10.3 million meals to minnesota kids.”