A certain pizza joint in the Detroit area now has a "hot-n-ready" option. Basically you go in and can get a pepperoni or plain cheese pizza that is made in advance and only costs $5. The problem is that they throw away all of the pre-made pizzas after they sit there for 15 minutes. The waste is enormous. I made the mistake of going in there once and when I asked the woman working there why they didn't save them and donate to the homeless shelter or something, she answered that "corporate was afraid of getting sued or something."
I told her that I wasn't going to ever come back because the waste of all of that food made me sick.

Another opportunity to feed the hungry if you have a garden. The "Plant a Row for the Hungry" program, a grassroots people-helping- people movement. If I had more than a porch I'd definitely participate!

The woman's lawsuit concerns may or may not be valid; depends upon the state. You need to check your states "Good Samaritan Law". For instance, in Massachusetts, there is a Good Samaritan Law which completely protects a restaurant or grocery store or whatever from getting sued if someone in a homeless shelter gets sick from the food. Thus, there is a lot of available food to these shelters. In contrast, New Mexico does not have such a law (or at least it didn't), and thus businesses really can't give away food; if their insurance company finds out, they're in trouble.

The answer, of course, is to not get mad at the Pizza place (although I DO like your approach!), but instead to a) find out about your state's law and b) lobby for a Good Samaritan Law in your state if it doesn't have one.

And by the way, Restaurants aren't the only offenders of throwing away food. As soon as food gets to, or sometimes even near, its expiration date, grocery stores throw it all in the trash.

Ken

Ken's is correct about Good Samaritan Laws - you should check out what is allowed in your area. I wouldn't blame a business for wasting preped/cooked food unless the law covered then for donating all types of food.

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A long time ago ( 10+ years ) I worked in a large kitchen that gave away food to the local shelters.

The food we sent out to shelters were preped/cooked leftovers and basic foods (fruit\milk\bread\juice\vegetables)
the food was always a few days before their best before date - ie still ediable by people but not useful in our particular kitchen.

Then we were sued ... turned out an individual eating at one of the shelters figured out that it was possible to go after us legaly through a shelter that we had provided food to. Even though there was a "Good Samaritan Law" it did not cover all of our actions, in particular giving away preped/cooked food.

After a long protracted battle the kitchen and the shelter were vindicated - we proved neither of our actions were the cause of the individual's poisoning.

The expense of the lawsuit was too much and the kitchen decided that it was better to no longer provide preped/cooked food to the shelters.

I think potential food donors might be interested in knowing that TASTES can differ between homeless/foodpoor people and the people giving it away.

I have no idea if this experience is universal, but I worked in a homeless shelter a while ago and we handed out a lot of food... Dept of Ag. surplus, extras from the local hot deli, etc. (Thank god nobody was thinking about lawsuits otherwise we never would have had this stuff).

I was always surprised about what was the most popular food -- the stuff the homeless guys would ask about and jump on the second it came in. It wasn't the "healthy food" popular with the shelter staff. Instead it was :
1) milk, even and especially canned evaporated milk
2) any kind of meat, even the grossest canned mystery meat that you'd worry about feeding to your dog. A can of bona fide Spam was a gourmet prize that could cause a shoving match if not handled correctly.

Starch left them nonplussed. We had plenty of rice and pasta, so that was their main diet and might have understandably been bored.

Canned vegetables were more popular than fresh. Beautiful produce brought in by local growers sat unused -- we had to put it out on the porch to give it away, and it was mostly shelter staff who ate it.

Who knows what the reasons for all these preferences were, but man those shelter guys craved meat and fat and even got testy when it seemed like somebody was hogging it.

At first I snobbishly put it down to poor dietary education, but after looking at them for a while -- a lot of them were pretty thin -- I started thinking that it might have reflected some real nutritional deficiencies that only meat could correct.

So hey, whatever you do, DO NOT THROW AWAY THOSE CANS OF SPAM. I promise you, somebody wants -- and might even need -- them.

bottleworld.net

Thanks, everyone. Bottleman, it seems like there are generally all sorts of class/taste conflicts whenever you have one population "serving" another. If we're looking at it as people at the workplace, I guess the best solution is to work with an organization that knows its population well and has a history of good, consistent work.

Oh, for sure Kyeann. I wasn't trying to discourage people from giving. Rather I think I was trying to say that things that donors might not think of as great food might actually be really valued by others, and also that some fancy foods can be problematic. Just call your local NGO to check before you bring the food by...

Second Harvest has set up networks among producers, grocers, restaurants, etc. to collect leftover foods and deliver them to local shelters in all 50 U.S. states. Before going off on your own to deliver foodstuffs to local pantries and kitchens, check to see if there is a Second Harvest operation in your community: http://www.secondharvest.org/zip_code.jsp

I guess my main problem with the pizza place is NOT that they didn't donate to the shelter. It's that people can't order ahead or wait for 5 minutes until their pizza is ready. The day that I found out about this, I had to wait for a cheese pizza anyway,because they were out. All of the pizzas that they where tossing out where pepperoni. Why do people need access to a pizza at a minutes notice all day long?

Umm you can call in and order what you want from Little Ceasars. Even if you walk in.