Publix to give $4 million in grants for food bank capital projects

Publix Super Markets will hand out an additional $4 million in grants to address food availability.

The Lakeland grocery giant announced the grant money at a Hunger Summit held at its corporate offices Thursday. The money, which is coming from its foundation, Publix Charities, will be in addition to grants it already hands out to food alleviation programs. It gave out 328 grants last year totaling $5.65 million.

The special grant is reserved for one-time capital needs or capacity building. Applications will be open to 40 invited organizations between March 1 and March 31.

Publix President Kevin Murphy says the company saw an opportunity to “make sure that monies were being used in multiple ways so that we could solve multiple problems.

“The campaign (will) help them with their infrastructure and help them with other areas outside of just providing more food.”

The $4 million in grants is in addition to $5 million in fresh produce the company has agreed to donate in areas where it operates.

Publix’s inaugural Hunger Summit brought officials from 36 Feeding America food bank operators from areas the grocer serves. The program featured presentations by some food bank chiefs, members of Congress and Publix officials. A roundtable discussion was held in the afternoon.

About 100 people in all attended.

“We brought them in, really, just to have some open and honest conversations today,” Murphy says.

“We really want to talk about what we're doing well, what we're doing that is working. And what type of opportunities and challenges they have — is there anything that we could do differently to be able to assist them and make their job of feeding people in need in their communities easier.”