The Snoqualmie Valley Food Bank (SVFB) is seeking an experienced nonprofit leader to help end food insecurity in our close-knit community nestled in the Cascade foothills. With a new facility opening in January 2027, this is an exciting moment to lead our next chapter of growth.
Our ideal candidate is experienced, mission driven, devoted to operational excellence, fluent in both the language of the heart and financial statements, and committed to creatively leading the SVFB and community into a brighter, more food-secure tomorrow.
About Us:
We have operated the food bank in our community for decades, officially incorporating as a nonprofit in 2013. In addition to providing food and nutrition, we serve as a resource hub for our clients, with weekly onsite access to services and support from our partner organizations.
How & Who We Serve:
The Snoqualmie Valley Food Bank’s (SVFB) mission is to end hunger in our community, guided by our values of collaboration, compassion, integrity, honor and accountability. We operate a ‘grocery store model’ food bank, empowering our visitors to make food and nutrition choices for themselves, and are constantly innovating to better meet the specific needs of our clients, such as:
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Seniors: One quarter of our clients are seniors (65 and better), who struggle with mobility issues, cognitive issues, and poor health. Getting to the food bank, waiting in line, shopping in tight quarters with walkers and wheelchairs, dealing with noisy crowds and finding simple meal solutions can be daunting barriers. To address these hurdles, we offer dedicated senior hours each week with a slower pace and less crowded shopping to best serve this at-risk group. We provide nutritious and fresh food for our seniors, who too often rely on prepackaged foods; easy open cans; and meal replacement beverages, like Ensure.
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Students: For our students, up to age 18, access to food is diminished during school breaks and vacations. Our ‘Meals for the Break’ program provides food for students when school is out, including easy to prepare foods like cereal and milk. Good nutrition is particularly important for growing children, and fruits, vegetables, meat, eggs and milk are included in our program. All these items are easy for children to prepare and eat.
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Immigrants: Over the past year, we have found that immigrant communities have hesitated to use, or stopped using, our food bank services, including our Latinx and Ukrainian clients. In response to this need, and to better serve clients whose work schedules make it difficult or impossible to shop during our open hours, we have created a food ‘ordering’ program. This allows clients to preorder their food, which is then ready for pick up at a particular time, reducing the amount of time that clients are at the food bank and reducing anxiety for these vulnerable groups. By having access to a ready supply of nutritious food and fresh produce, we can fulfill these orders with high quality foods. ?
The Need:
Food insecurity is not a new problem and is growing in our region. Many people in our area are struggling with increased costs for housing, medical care, utilities, food, gas, and childcare—which often results in food insecurity. Compared to January 2021, the average household in Washington is spending $169 more on food per month, up $28 a month from a year ago. In King County, 9.7% (almost 1 in 10) experienced food insecurity in 2022, and the number continues to climb.
The Snoqualmie Valley’s population has also seen a great deal of growth in the past decade, as housing costs force families further away from jobs in Seattle, Redmond and Bellevue, with a further impact on local housing costs. Longtime residents of the Snoqualmie Valley, which until recently was best described as rural and low cost, are struggling to keep their homes and feed themselves in what have become commuter exurbs.
In FY 2024, our food bank served 958 unique households, up 10% from FY 2023. These households comprised 2,852 unique people, a 14% increase from FY 2023. By the time we open the doors of our new home in 2027 we expect to be serving 1054 unique households (another 10% increase), made up of 3251 unique individuals (another 14% increase).
Our New Home:
We purchased a new site for our work in April of 2025 and are in the process of renovating this location to support a larger, more efficient and ADA compliant food bank. This move will not only allow us to better meet our mission; it was necessitated by the loss of our current lease at a local church.
We are 50% towards completion of our Capital Campaign funding goal of $5M. Permits have been submitted for site development, with submission of our renovation permit slated for February 2026. We expect to begin site improvements shortly thereafter, with slated opening of our new location in January of 2027.
Considering the dramatic and much needed changes that SVFB has undertaken, in 2025 the Board of Directors adopted three core priorities, a pragmatic and action-oriented plan to guide our efforts. They include:
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Increase Our Organizational Capacity
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Successfully Execute Our $5M Capital Campaign
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Renovate and Open Our New Food Bank
Organization & Budget:
As the region’s main hunger relief provider, we maintain a low barrier to service and welcome those facing food insecurity to our table. Our service area includes the cities of North Bend, Snoqualmie, Fall City, Preston, and rural unincorporated King County, including Snoqualmie Pass. All are welcome at our table.
We currently have a staff of eight; 4 full-time employees, and four part-time employees. We rely on over 100 volunteers each month to meet our mission, had over 1000 donors support our work in 2025 (a threefold increase over 2024), and have adopted a FY 2026 budget of $2.36M, which includes significant in-kind donations of food. Our board has almost doubled in the past year, from 5 to 9 committed volunteers.
Community backing, through both financial and in-kind contributions and direct volunteer engagement, is the lifeblood of the Snoqualmie Valley Food Bank; this support is essential for day-to-day operations and will continue to be a focus of our operations over time.
For additional information about our organization, visit our website: https://www.snoqualmievalleyfoodbank.org/
About You:
You are an entrepreneurial, dynamic, and experienced nonprofit leader with excellent people and operations skills who thrives while building and strengthening organizations and you have commitment to and passion for a hunger-free future.
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Mission-driven career focus. You have demonstrated your commitment to using your skills and talents to make the world a better place for all people, through your past experiences. Experience in the human services or food bank sector is seen as a significant advantage, as is a community organizing background and understanding of logistics.
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Entrepreneurial pragmatist. You’ve been a professional leader in small nonprofits where you have successfully managed both the forest and the trees, leading with vision, clarity, and enthusiasm while also (cheerfully) rolling up your sleeves and pitching in as needed. You understand the realities of the nonprofit sector where commitment to the mission is paired with constrained resources and entrepreneurial approaches are needed.
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Change leader with executive maturity. You excel at managing change, sharing your vision and empowering the group to embrace new ways of working, building trust, addressing resistance, and fostering ownership and can speak to your ability to bring an organization through a major transition and evolution.
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Emotionally-intelligent supervisor. You successfully and confidently lead your team through coaching, inspiration, education, humor, and recognition with evident positive people outcomes.
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Financially prudent. You understand financial statements, reporting, audit requirements, 990s—and appreciate how important prudent fiscal management is to sustainability and success, with demonstrated experience managing nonprofit finances.
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Strong partner with Board of Directors. You have the experience and confidence to work with a nonprofit board of directors who, like you, lead with vision but are often called upon to roll up their sleeves in a pinch. You have demonstrated abilities to evolve and support a community-based board of directors through strategic partnership with the board.
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Room captivator. You are a strong communicator—in writing, in action and in speech, and are equally comfortable with community volunteers and other community leaders.
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Champion of volunteer-centered leadership. You honor and respect the important role of volunteers as partners in meeting the agency’s mission.
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Small community navigator. You understand small communities, particularly those with wealth and racial disparities. You have successfully worked to understand a community’s culture, and can build trust and relationships throughout the community, from the mayor to the local store owner to the teenaged volunteer, authentically and quickly. You excel at leveraging relationships across multiple levels to ‘get things done’ for your organization to meet its mission.
Key Focus Areas for New Executive:
The new Executive Director will lead to achieve operational excellence, including systematizing operations and navigating a critical transition, while building a foundation for a more sustainable future with the following immediate priorities.
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Confidently Step into Visible Leadership of the Organization. The organization has an immediate need for the new leader to:
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Support the team, stabilizing and leading them out of the interim period while earning their trust and commitment
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Visibly lead in the community, with an emphasis on meeting community leaders, volunteers, donors and peer agencies in the first 90 days
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Continue to improve and strengthen operations, seeking operational excellence with a combination of creativity and a can-do attitude.
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Complete the Capital Campaign and Facility Transition. The Executive Director will be responsible for preparing, planning and moving the organization into the new facility, and ensuring that the campaign funding has been secured. Additional planning and working with the team to maximize use of the new space with improved systems and processes are critical.
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Facilitate Strategic Planning and Vision Setting. Once the orientation phase has passed, and the leader has had an opportunity to assess the organization for themselves, they will lead a longer-range strategic process, in partnership with the board, to create a proactive, forward-looking vision and plan for the organization and building and executing a successful, diversified fundraising plan that balances urgency with sustainability.
