The American Heart Association will support SAME Café through a $200,000 grant from its social impact funds, as it is estimated that about one in 10 households in the United States experienced food insecurity in 2020.
SAME Café is a nonprofit restaurant and workforce development program providing culinary training and access to fresh, affordable meals for the Toledo community.
The funding opportunity was made possible by a donation through the FirstEnergy Foundation’s multi-year “Investing with Purpose” (IWP) initiative, which ran from 2020-22 and was designed to help communities served by FirstEnergy’s electric companies. Toledo is the first community in Ohio to receive foundation funding through the social impact fund.
“Investing with Purpose was developed as a timely and relevant response to the COVID pandemic and national events highlighting racial and social injustices,” said Lorna Wisham, president of the FirstEnergy Foundation. “We’re proud to support SAME Café—an organization that understands the greater purpose food serves in building a brighter, stronger and healthier community for all—and we’re proud to see the positive impact that our IWP investments continue to have in Toledo thanks to the social impact fund.”
The American Heart Association is proud to support the café as they work to create a community around good, healthy food in downtown Toledo. This organization is actively working to break down the social drivers of health that can negatively impact cardiovascular health from their location in the main library.
“SAME Café unifies the community in a safe place while enjoying healthy foods,” said Claudia Annoni, executive director of the café. “We’re so thankful for this grant, which will allow us to sustain our mission of connecting neighbors in meaningful ways to provide each other with support and hope.”
People living in lower-income areas have significantly higher rates of unhealthy diets. For people living in areas without convenient access to a grocery store or where the only sources of food are from fast food chains or convenience stores, eating healthy can be extremely difficult, if not impossible. This leaves people in historically disadvantaged communities with a shorter life expectancy and an increased risk of complex health problems. Lack of consistent access to healthy foods puts people in the community at risk of heart disease, diabetes and some types of cancer.
“Where you live should not dictate how long or how well a person lives—but it does,” said Mindy Hartwick, executive director for the American Heart Association in Toledo.
Social impact funds channel capital to both non-profit or for-profit social entrepreneurs working in the community. The funds specifically support social enterprises that are addressing health care access and quality, economic empowerment and food security.
