(L-R) Avi Spitzer, Council Member Susan Zhuang, Hannah Lupien, City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams, Mets Council CEO David Greenfield and Joyce Xie attended the Met Council Passover food distribution. Photo by Gabriele Holtermann
Ahead of Passover, which begins at sundown on April 12, the Met Council’s Borough Park hub distributed thousands of pounds of groceries to food-insecure community members so they can celebrate the liberation of the Jewish people from Egyptian slavery with dignity.
According to the UJA Federation of New York, 36% of Jewish households in Brooklyn live at or near the poverty line. Borough Park has one of the city’s highest Jewish poverty rates, and nearly 50% of Jewish households in Brooklyn Hub’s immediate neighborhoods earn less than $50,000 annually. The Met Council distributed food — including Passover staples like matzah, chicken, fish, grape juice, eggs, oil, and fresh produce — to more than 250,000 New Yorkers.
Avi Spitzer, managing director of Met Council’s Brooklyn Hub, told Brooklyn Paper that this year’s distribution was more important than ever given the high cost of food, particularly eggs. Eggs are an essential food item during Passover as they symbolize the cycle of rebirth and renewal, he explained.
“[For] families, especially large families, day-to-day living is hard enough,” Spitzer said. “It’s further impacted over the holiday [when] the people that need [food] most don’t always have what they need. So they can at least go into the holiday with a clear mind knowing that they can put food on the table, feed their children, and they can have a joyous holiday.”
According to Hannah Lupien, managing director of Food Programs at the Met Council, the Borough Park distribution event was one of the organization’s largest.
The hub distributed food to more than 800 families over three days. The Met Council was a crucial lifeline for the families the organization serves, Lucien said, especially during Passover, one of the priciest Jewish holidays regarding food.
While this week’s distribution was for large families who picked up cases of food by car, the org is planning another event next week for smaller families and seniors who aren’t picking up full, large cases of food.
City Council Speaker and Democratic mayoral candidate Adrienne Adams toured the Brooklyn Hub’s 13,600-square-foot facility and helped with the distribution on April 2.
After loading cars with Passover provisions alongside Met Council CEO David Greenfield and Council Member Susan Zhuang, Adams told Brooklyn Paper that, given exorbitant food prices, the Met Council was going the “extra mile” for New Yorkers to ensure they were “happy and healthy.”
“Met Council takes care of the people the way that the people deserve to be taken care of. And, my goodness, food distribution in a time like this, particularly for Passover now, it just makes an amazing difference in the lives of 1000s, and we thank them,” Adams said.
Greenfield added that the food distribution was possible thanks to the Adams’ assistance.
“Under the Speaker’s leadership, the Council has been giving more resources to help New Yorkers in need than ever before, and we’ve been doing this for 50 years,” he said.
Greenfield explained that the Speaker and the City Council had provided more resources because they understood the economic situation.
“So we’re especially grateful to the Speaker for making lives a little more affordable for New Yorkers, and we’re really grateful for her leadership and everything that she’s done for the city of New York,” Greenfield said.
Zhuang, whose district includes Borough Park, thanked the Met Council for ensuring that working-class New Yorkers and low-income families had food on the table.
“Every single year, [Met Council] are doing food deliveries before Passover. They actually help put the joy on the family table,” Zhuang said. “[Food] is very expensive right now; putting food on the table, especially for middle-income families, working-class families, is very important.”