Get Involved
Our Needs
Our food bank customers are working hard to make Big Sky run – they are the workforce who teach our kids, serve our meals, guide our tourists, and keep our landscapes and amenities clean and beautiful.
Despite working so hard on behalf of our community, our customers often can’t make ends meet due to our high housing costs and inadequate wages. They describe food, housing, and mental health as some of their most acute needs here in Big Sky.
What can you do to help?
Opportunities to support Big Sky Community Food Bank
Financial Support
The Big Sky Community Food Bank runs on an annual budget of just over $200,000 that includes space, staffing and programming in addition to food purchase.
We rely on about 1/3 or our budget to come from individuals and community donors. We also receive funding from the Big Sky Resort Area District (Resort Tax), and all of the philanthropic community foundations (YCCF, SPCF, MCF)
Volunteer
Like many other non-profits in Big Sky, we utilize the community-wide Volunteer Big Sky platform to organize service opportunities for our community. Create a profile and keep up-to-date on our opportunities, as well as any Big Sky program that you’re in to!
Food Donation and Rescue
When vacationers and community members donate surplus food to the food bank, it helps us decrease our food spending!
Consider hosting a creative food drive, or encouraging your visitors to donate vacation surplus items to the food bank. Purchase and extra item at the Farmer’s Market and donate it at our cooler each week, or drop items in our donation bins around town.
Advocate
Because Big Sky is an unincorporated town which straddles two counties, we rely totally on a collaboration of non-profits and special districts to get things done. Your voice is powerful in creating the Big Sky we all want to see. There are MANY ways to get involved! Engage with Resort Tax, the Big Sky Chamber, any of your favorite non-profits, Navigate Big Sky, or your HOA. Big Sky Community Week is the first week of October each year.
As a member of the Montana Food Bank Network, we often look to them for guidance on state and federal issues.
Opportunities to support our community partners
The HRDC
The Big Sky Community Food Bank is a program of HRDC, and we work together to meet the needs of the Gallatin Valley.
For almost 50 years HRDC has been committed to building a better community. To continue that tradition and keep pace with growth in our area, we are proud to introduce HRDC’s Community Commons which will offer two buildings, Market Place and Homeward Point.
Wellness in Action
WIA enriches the lives of people in Big Sky by providing sliding-scale counseling, classes on substance abuse and other behavioral health issues, and well-being opportunities such as camp scholarships.
Be Well Big Sky
Big Sky’s mental health and wellness resource tool. Connect with wellness navigators, find providers and read stories about mental health.
Big Sky Community Housing Trust
The purpose of the Big Sky Housing Community Trust is to improve the availability of affordable housing for the Big Sky community.
Bienvenidos a Gallatin Valley
Connecting new Spanish-speaking families with local mentors, volunteers, and professionals who help families meet their goals through language acquisition, coordination of services, access to community resources, and advocacy.