Group Sees Problems at Food Bank

A group of Moorpark residents has complained to city officials that the local food bank is poorly run, has turned eligible people away and discriminates against Latinos.

City Councilman Roy E. Talley Jr. said Wednesday residents have told him the program for distributing surplus government food is not evenhanded with the families who depend on it.

“It’s a selective choosing of who the food’s going to . . .,” Talley said. “I even hear there might be some prejudice.”

The program has been run for eight years by volunteer Anna Bell Sessler, who has a contract with Food Share Inc., an Oxnard-based group that distributes surplus food from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Sessler declined to comment on the allegations, except to say she believes a local group is conspiring to take over the Food Share program from her.

“We’re not going to give the Food Share program to anybody else, and that’s that,” she said, adding that she won a national award recently recognizing her years of volunteer efforts in Ventura County.

Sessler drives her own truck to the Food Share warehouse in Oxnard to pick up butter, flour, cheese and other staples, said Ethel Sulkis, a volunteer who works with her.

In Moorpark, Sessler and half a dozen elderly volunteers pack the food into bags for about 300 families who qualify for the monthly distribution, which has recently taken place at the community center.

Complaints about the food giveaway surfaced last week after Sessler turned away two elderly women who qualify for the program. Resident Vina Milburn said she intervened and scuffled with Sessler.

Milburn picked up a bag of food for one of the women and headed toward the door, she said, but Sessler grabbed the bag, and it broke. Milburn went next door to City Hall to complain to city officials after unsuccessfully trying to grab a box of food as she left.

Sessler said she mistakenly thought the two women no longer qualified for the program. But Milburn and some other residents said the incident was an example of the management of the program.

Food Share has not received any complaints about the Moorpark program until recently, Executive Director Jewel Pedi said.

Although the organization has a policy of monitoring sites every year, it hasn’t visited the Moorpark food distribution site in four years, she said. A monitor will attend the December distribution, Pedi said.

The Moorpark distribution operates on a first-come, first-served basis, recipients complained.

“Those who came first got most,” said Joe Latunski, who has received surplus food for about five years. He also said large families who qualify for the program often get the same amount of food as individuals who live alone, which would violate Food Share policy.

In addition, some volunteers who work with Sessler have exhibited prejudice toward the Latino residents who receive commodities, Latunski said.

“They have been rude to minorities, Mexican people,” Latunski said. “I’ve heard them say, ‘Those damn Mexicans. They’re double-dipping . . .,’ ” he said.

But volunteer Sulkis, who said she has helped with the Moorpark food distribution for several years, defended Sessler and the program.

“Anna Bell doesn’t pack the bags,” Sulkis said. The bags are packed by volunteers, and extra food is added to bags for large families, she said.

Sulkis said she has not witnessed any examples of favoritism or racial prejudice at the distributions. “I have not seen it happening,” she said.

In addition to residents’ allegations that Sessler’s group does not distribute commodities fairly, city officials have raised questions about whether the group meets Food Share’s requirements for distributing commodities.

Food Share requires each of its 72 commodity distribution sites around the county to be sponsored by a tax-exempt organization, Pedi said.

Sessler recently signed a contract with Food Share to distribute commodities under the auspices of a newly formed group, Moorpark Active Senior Citizens, which is not tax-exempt.

Partly because of concerns over the group’s tax status, the City Council decided this week not to waive the rent at the community center for the food distribution program.

Councilman Scott Montgomery said Thursday that he is concerned about Food Share putting the Moorpark program into the hands of a group that does not have proper authority.

“I have some real questions of Food Share frankly,” Montgomery said. “I really am concerned about how they go about verifying the authority, the people they allow to distribute food.”

Pedi said the contract went to Moorpark Active Senior Citizens because it has applied for tax exemption and because of Sessler’s long record of running the Moorpark program.

Sessler started the Moorpark food distribution and kept it going over the years when no church or other group offered to take on the job, Pedi said.