As Contract Deadline Looms, San Antonio Event Planner Falls Short on Deliveries to Needy Families
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With a Tuesday, June 30 deadline looming, event planning company CRE8AD8 appears to have delivered just a sixth of the food boxes required under its $39 million federal contract to help feed hungry families.
As of Friday, June 26, the San Antonio-based firm had delivered just 123,000 of the 750,000 boxes of produce, dairy and meat called for under the pact, the Express-News reports, citing records from food banks in Texas and six other states.
CRE8AD8 drew double takes when it landed a major contract with the U.S. Department of Agriculture for its Farmers to Families Food Box Program despite a complete lack of food distribution experience. The company has drawn criticism from both lawmakers and nonprofits, who questioned whether it was qualified to deliver on the work.
“The whole tragedy of this contract being awarded was that it actually hurt our city,” San Antonio Food Bank CEO Eric Cooper said in an interview with Express-News writer Tom Orsborn for MSN.com. “CRE8AD8 just couldn’t seem to deliver.”
While the Farmers to Families Food Box Program has delivered more than 20 million food boxes nationwide, CRE8AD8 continues to fall short. To date, the company has delivered fewer than 22 of 57 scheduled truckloads of food to the SA Food Bank, Cooper told Orsborn.
To put that in perspective, 22 truckloads of food is about what the Food Bank distributes in a single week.
Following the close of the initial contract timeframe, Farmers to Families contract awardees will be up for possible extensions, which will run through August.
“It’s time that USDA allows a more competent contractor to nourish the hungry,” Cooper also told Orsborn. “CRE8AD8’s gamble on whether it could execute the entire contract kept food from needy families.”
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