Meet OGC Mission Fund Grant Recipient: West Seattle Food Bank

West Seattle Food Bank (WSFB) was started by a group of neighbors who rallied together to support their community. Now, over 40 years later, WSFB provides wraparound support including food, clothing and emergency rental and utility assistance.  

WSFB’s reach is massive. With two locations, they distribute over 2.2 million pounds of food, give away well over 120 thousand clothing items and provide more than $800,000 in rental assistance per year. WSFB has risen to meet a need that grew during COVID and never came back down. 

WSFB focuses on getting expensive, high-quality, nutritious food to people who might not otherwise be able to afford it, helping families stretch their budgets and spend more on the things that matter most to them.  

“We buy up to $1 million a year in produce, protein and milk,” said WSFB’s Development Director, Robbin Peterson. “People might be surprised to hear that food drives, while vital, account for 5% of the food we distribute in a year. We buy about 65%, and the rest comes from partnerships with organizations like Northwest Harvest. We’re intentional with what we buy—we try to purchase from small, local, organic farms so that we can support those farms and provide the healthiest food possible.” 

In 2025, OGC gave WSFB a Mission Fund grant. “Your gift came the day before we saw a 60% increase in shoppers that week,” shared Robbin. “SNAP hadn’t been funded Nov. 1, and your gift came Nov. 3, just as we were preparing for more shoppers. It really made a difference during that difficult time when we were having to purchase significantly more food.” 

“We’d heard from clients that SNAP only covers about half of a household’s monthly food budget for a lot of families,” continued Robbin. “Which means that when SNAP was destabilized, a lot of people didn’t have food stocked up. So, we spent your grant on things like rice and beans. And when people came in and got their produce and meat, we invited them to take as many of the pantry staples as they needed to fill their cabinet at home so that if SNAP wasn’t funded again, they had a backup.” 

WSFB has more food assistance programs beyond the food bank. They run mobile food banks at eight sites, complete over 400 home deliveries every week and offer a weekend backpack program for kids. They deliver packs to 14 schools; each pack includes six meals and two snacks. In 2024, they distributed 9,007 of those packs to area schools—in 2025, that number grew to 14,656. This year, they’re on track to far exceed that number as grocery prices continue to climb.  

With only 12 employees, WSFB couldn’t do this work without volunteers. For example, the backpack program has only one employee managing it; a volunteer team shows up every week to pack backpacks and deliver them to schools. 

“As the need has grown, our community support has also grown. When people realize that their neighbors need help, they pitch in. Nobody wants anyone in this community to struggle. But that's how we survive this stuff, right? That's how humans have always survived. We're foolish to think we can do it without each other.” 

OGC’s Mission Fund Grant Program promotes equity in the food system, increases access to organic food and more. WSFB is just one of many organizations the Mission Fund supported in 2025. Find the complete list of grant recipients here.