(upbeat music) - Hi everyone, Steve Adubato.

We kick off this program with our longtime friend Bernie Flynn, Chief Executive Officer of a terrific organization called Mercer Street Friends.

The website will be up.

Good to see you, my friend.

- Good to see you, Steve.

- Well, Bernie, you have gone from the corporate community at NJM, a longtime underwriter of public broadcasting to not-for-profit leadership.

When you left the corporate world, was it your game plan to lead such an important nonprofit organization?

- No, Steve, I didn't have a specific game plan.

I knew I wanted to contribute in the nonprofit space, particularly have a role in education, which Mercer Street Friends does.

But I bounced around a little bit.

I took a graduate course in early childhood education.

I consulted with Mercer Street Friends, and I really made a choice between creating my own nonprofit or joining Mercer Street Friends.

And I felt joining Mercer Street Friends and adding value to this organization was the right move.

And I'm so thrilled I did it.

Although I started February of 2020, and then the pandemic hit, so it got a little crazy.

- As the website's up, Mercer Street Friends created 1958.

- Yeah.

- Describe in addition to its food security, education and family support, the primary areas.

- That's it.

- Who is being served, Bernie?

Is it focused largely in Trenton?

- Yeah, the focus is in Trenton, although we serve all of Mercer County with our food mission.

We are the Feeding America Food Bank for Mercer County.

So we're part of a nationwide network and the Community Food Bank of New Jersey functions like a big sister to us.

So they're very supportive and helpful.

But we do the work of a food bank here in Mercer County, which means we're the wholesaler.

We just bought a brand new warehouse and brand new to us.

First time we've owned our warehouse property.

And that will help serve Mercer County for years to come.

But we have a network of over a hundred partners, pantries, soup kitchens, churches, all who distribute the food to the community to ensure, you know, that there is enough nutritious food for everybody in Mercer County.

- How serious is the food insecurity problem in the state, particularly in the Mercer County/Trenton area?

- Well, I have to tell you, Steve, it's been a surprise to me, how, I'll say, rampant food insecurity is.

Across the country, you start with roughly 10% of the population is food insecure.

And we, I thought that-- - Define it, Bernie, I'm so sorry for interrupting.

Define food insecure.

- Those individuals and families that aren't sure where their next meal is coming from.

You know, we don't have.

- They have no idea what, and they're scrambling to put food on the table.

- Think of that stress, Steve, when you're not sure whether you have enough money to feed your kids over the weekend or for the next week.

That's food insecurity and a substantial portion of the population suffers from it.

We can address it.

We can solve this problem.

It will take a lot of time and a lot of partnership between, you know, public and private entities.

But we're on the front lines here and we see a continuing need in the food insecurity space.

I thought that the peak would be in the pandemic.

- Right - During that time.

But the federal supports and the tremendous philanthropy that was energized during the pandemic enabled us to, you know, meet the mission at that time.

And now federal supports are gone.

Inflation is still a problem for those on the margins.

And food insecurity continues to rise in New Jersey, in Mercer County and certainly in Trenton.

- You know, beyond the issue, and I don't know if it's beyond the issue, Bernie, of food insecurity, but education, I mean, kids going to school hungry.

I mean, for those of us who are so blessed, we often take that for granted that our kids have breakfast.

Not the case for way too many kids.

One is too many, which is a cliche, but true.

The organization, the Mercer Street Friends is getting more involved in the Trenton Public schools?

- Yes.

- Talk about that.

- Well, that-- - And why, what is it and why?

- Well, it's really what drew me to Mercer Street Friends.

We are the lead community school agency in the city of Trenton.

And that means that we're an organization that helps remove barriers to learning.

So we are providing resources.

We're a convener and a collaborator.

Plus we have our own staff that are embedded in three schools in Trenton, two elementary and one middle school, where they, our staff partners with the principal and the rest of the staff at the school and brings in reading intervention support.

We do summer programs.

We bring in all sorts of health supports, physical, mental, oral, you know, whatever is needed for the families and the children so that they can focus on learning and enable teachers to do their job.

So there aren't these distractions or the inability to attend school for whatever reason.

Chronic absenteeism is something that we address.

So it's a movement that is nationwide, this community school movement.

And we're one of the leaders in the state of New Jersey, because we don't have a lot of community schools here.

State of California has dedicated four and a half billion dollars to the community school model, four and a half billion.

We haven't dedicated anything yet.

- So there's no money, state government money here.

- There is not.

And that's something that we will be advocating for over time.

It will take a while to make sure that there is sufficient funding for the community school model in underserved areas in the state of New Jersey.

That's one of the reasons I'm here, Steve.

And that it will take a concerted effort and a tremendous coalition to make that happen.

But the community school model is gaining ground and traction across the country.

It's working very effectively in New York State, not just New York City.

And the time has come for the state of New Jersey to start stepping up in that regard.

- Bernie, real quick, I should have asked this at the top of the interview, Mercer Street Friends, Mercer Street, what's the name stand for?

- Yeah.

We were started at 151 Mercer Street in the Mill Hill section of Trenton.

A historic area of Trenton where, you know, Washington won the Battle of Trenton and the Quakers use the 151 Mercer Street as a community center.

And we have evolved over 66 years, but many people think we're a school, while we're focused on education.

You know, and we do have a preschool.

We're a social services organization and we've evolved over time.

And now we're embedded in the space of being the food bank for Mercer County, being the lead community school agency in this city, and also providing family support, over a hundred families.

We, you know, we help.

- Hey Bernie, listen, I said this before we got on the air and I just wanna share this in the appropriate way.

In a previous life when Bernie Flynn was the CEO of New Jersey manufacturers and there was an effort to keep public television alive in the state through our leader of public television, Neal Shapiro, at the WNET group, it was in fact Bernie Flynn is one of the first corporate leaders who stepped up at New Jersey manufacturers to support that initiative and other corporations jumped in.

I wanted to say that, not just for full disclosure, but because it matters, it matters.

- That's it, Bernie.

Thank you my friend.

- Thank you Steve, appreciate it.

And look forward to doing more in the food security space.

You know, and Community Food bank in New Jersey.

- That's right.

- And the other food banks in the Feeding American Network.

- This is not a one-off my friend.

We'll keep the programming going.

Bernie Flynn, Chief Executive Officer, Mercer Street Friends.

Thank you Bernie, appreciate it.

- Okay, thanks Steve.

- You got it.

Stay with us, we'll be right back.

- [Narrator] One-On-One with Steve Adubato is a production of the Caucus Educational Corporation.

Celebrating 30 years in public broadcasting.

Funding has been provided by The Russell Berrie Foundation.

NJM Insurance Group.

PSEG Foundation.

Newark Board of Education.

Johnson & Johnson.

PSE&G, Wells Fargo.

Community FoodBank of New Jersey.

And by Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey.

Promotional support provided by CIANJ, and Commerce Magazine.

And by ROI-NJ.