Road Runner Food Bank to hold special food distribution event in Tijeras

Road Runner Food Bank is planning to hold a special food distribution on Nov. 6, starting at 3 p.m.

The distribution will be located at the Tijeras Village Hall, and is expected to serve about 250 households, according to Road Runner Communications Officer Sonya Warwick.

Warwick said that extra food came via the Coronavirus Family to Food Box Program, which helps secure additional food for organizations like Road Runner to distribute more food to families. She also said that there may be more pop up distributions in the future, as well.

“I can’t guarantee where, I cannot tell you when, because the influx of food that’s coming in has been not within our control, at all,” she said. “It arrives and often we have to get that distributed because it’s highly perishable and we need to make sure we get it out and distribute it in a timely fashion for families to use. That’s part of the reason that that is happening because it’s coming to us not necessarily in times when we’re expecting so we have to quickly set up distributions for them, for these locations or for those products to get out into communities.”

Warwick said that Road Runner picks communities based on need and lots of other reasons.

“We do look at pounds per person in need and try to fill some of those gaps with additional product going into those locations in general, so we’re very cognizant of that kind of thing,” she said. “We’re trying to look for communities and positioning food distributions where we know there is increased need.”

In addition to these pop-up distributions, Road Runner also partners with East Mountain Food Pantry, Valley View Christian Church, and First Choice Community Health Care for regular distributions.

East Mountain Food Pantry distributes food six days a week: Mondays from 2:00 p.m. to 4 p.m., Tuesdays from 9 a.m. to 3:00 p.m., Wednesdays from 1:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m., Thursdays from 2:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m., Fridays from 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m., and Saturdays from 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.

Valley View Church distributes food on the fourth Thursday of every month from 4:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m.

First Choice Community Healthcare distributes food at their clinic in Edgewood every other Wednesday, Warwick said. The next one will be on Nov. 11.