The "Manhattan Optimist Club Bulletin": Vol. 2024 #41: 7-10-24
VOLUME 2024 JULY 10, 2024 NUMBER 41
Jerry Benaka presented the following reflection: Quote from the The Path to Greater Things by Christian D. Larson:
(In 1912 Larson published a poem that eventually became the Optimist Creed, which in 1922 was adopted by Optimist International, better known as the Optimist Clubs.)
The flag salute followed.
Heather Peterson introduced Karla Hagemeister, Flint Hills Breadbasket Director. She thanked the Optimist for having her speak today. The Breadbasket has been around since 1982. As the organization has grown over the years, they have held on to great people who have been there from the beginning. She has been with the Breadbasket just over two and a half years. She came into a healthy organization with a great base of volunteers and a system setup for all their different services, but there were still unmet needs in the community. When she came on board, there were three employees, including herself. Since then, they have grown their staff, their volunteers, and their services. They continue to support the four church pantries that had been with the Breadbasket for a long time, and now have grown the number of pantries to seven.
The Breadbasket acts as a community wide collection point and they have a warehouse to receive items in volume or bulk from food drives, recovery from grocery stores, and from Harvesters. They are open on site for five days per week and also send food to the seven different churches, including one in northern Riley County which is run by several churches, but housed in the library in Riley.
They have also grown to meet the needs of the community through additional access. In 2022, a normal day would serve 20-25 household visitors each of the five days they were open. They altered some of the access restrictions that prevented some needy families from accessing food at the Breadbasket. They also expanded their service area from just the city of Manhattan to all of Riley County, western Pottawatomie County, and Ft. Riley. The Breadbasket is now a very busy place when they are open. The space they have for guests to select food is very small and they can only allow so many guests in at any one time. In the two- and one-half-hour window, they served 65 to 75 households each day. On the day they are open into the evening, they served 136 families. Just this past week they have served over 250 households. They are also striving to offer healthier foods to families, so they have access to a good diet and good nutrition. Last year they had 18,000 families visit and they give one-half gallon of milk to each if they want it, and they spent about $37,000 on milk last year.
About a year ago, the Breadbasket engaged Anderson Knight to look at their physical space. In their original location, they started in a shed, then built a small building, and finally the warehouse. The City of Manhattan provided the land for the buildings but retains ownership. The Breadbasket needs to expand the facilities to meet the needs of their guests. Unfortunately, after an analysis, they do not have the space to expand on that site. They began to search for properties and were contacted by an agent to look at a property, the Furniture Warehouse, since the owner was retiring. She took a tour and then the members of the Breadbasket’s board also took a tour. All felt there was potential in the space for what they could do today, as well as what they could do in the future. They space gives them adequate space for now and growing room for the future. The board felt this was the right place at the right time for their organization. It will provide space for theirS guests to select food in the space of a convenience store instead of the current space of a studio apartment. There will be space for expanding services, such as English as a second language classes. In April they purchased the building and will take possession of it in the fall. They are currently fundraising for the facility and remodeling. Early projections are for an opening in about a year.
Second Vice President Kelly Karl introduced today’s speaker, Karla Hagemeister, Flint Hills Breadbasket Director and noted Diane Havenstein.
Mike Fincham introduced Matt Murphy, former member of the Manhattan Optimist Club.
Club Stuff/Announcements:
Bruce Bidwell thanked the Manhattan Optimist Club members who pitched in to help with the 8U/10U Kansas USA Softball Tournament that was held at Optimist Park on Saturday, July 6, 2024.
Bryan Joy Greg Wurst
Heather Peterson announced that that the Just Try It is Saturday, August 10th from 7:30 to 12:30 and she will need volunteers to help.
Save these dates: September 28, football parking for the OSU game; October 19, Aggieville Chili Crawl.
Adjourned with the Optimist Creed
Next Weeks’s Meeting:
JULY 17: MORNING MEETING: Mike Finnegan, PHD, D-ABFA, Forensic Anthropologist: Topic: “War Dead Recoveries: Vietnam”
July Meetings:
JULY 24: NOON MEETING: Ron Wells: Topic: “Classic Car Restoration”
JULY 31: MORNING MEETING: Business Meeting