Food for Thought

George Ortiz Jr. ’23 founded the Elisha Project with small change and big dreams.

July 21, 2011. For the third week in a row, George Ortiz Jr. ’23 and his family are making brown bag lunches to hand out to people living on the streets. Each includes a sandwich, chips and an apple, in a bag decorated with a color drawing by one of his young children.

Ortiz posts a photo on his blog of the week’s provisions — a small bag of Roma tomatoes, head of lettuce, Oscar Mayer ham and salami kits — laid out on their table. He writes, “We are onto something.”

Fourteen years later, the Elisha Project has shared more than 20 million pounds of rescued food, plus household goods, hygiene products and furniture to communities from New England to Texas, Puerto Rico and Guatemala, and as far as Ukraine, Cabo Verde and South Asia. Their outreach has grown to include pop-up street kitchens, bodegas and drive-through share markets, in addition to regularly sending supplies by the truckloads to food banks, schools, hospitals, churches and charitable organizations. The emphasis is on fresh fruits and vegetables, meats and perishables hard to come by at food banks, and culturally sensitive foods. Everyone, from his team behind the scenes and network of partners, to the many millions served, is now part of the family.

As a kid growing up in Brooklyn, Ortiz found his refuge in school. He was a voracious reader, taking the train every week to his grandmother’s house, always with a quarter to buy a book on the way. The eldest of five, he was a father figure to his siblings almost as soon as he could talk (“I never saw myself as a little kid,” he says), while his young mother did her best to provide. “I grew up on welfare, food stamps,” says Ortiz. “School was a place where I didn’t have to have the most money, I just had to get good grades.”  

Tragedy struck as a teenager when his 7-year-old brother died and his mother was arrested for neglect. Ortiz lived with his grandmother at the time. “She was a wonderful mother who fell on hard times,” says Ortiz. “She ended up dying at 40 years old in prison. When you think of all that, I should be a different person.” Instead, he doubled down on his determination to create a different path for himself. “I knew there was more to life than what you are born into.”

His inherent discipline drew him to the Marines, where he graduated top of his class and served 15 years, retiring with a disability after serving in Desert Storm. Living then in California, he founded a highly successful customer data research company with several Fortune 500 clients on its roster before he moved to Rhode Island with his wife, Carrie, to take care of his ailing grandmother. Despite his childhood vow never to be poor again — “I wanted nothing to do with poverty, nothing” — the cross-country transition strained the company, and they lost the business. 

With a young child and another on the way, Ortiz and his wife found themselves suddenly desperate while he struggled to find a new job. “I was trying to take any job, sweeping floors, I didn’t care.” At the lowest point, they found that their previous income disqualified them from accessing food banks and other local services. Ortiz says, “I think a real ‘aha moment’ for me was one lady asking me, ‘What did you do with all your money?’ I remember the shame and embarrassment I felt.” 

As soon as they found their footing — a hard-won effort during which Ortiz also returned to school to earn a master’s degree in divinity while working full-time — the couple was determined to give others the help they had not been able to find. “How much money do we have?” Ortiz remembers asking Carrie. “Forty-eight dollars and fifty cents,” she told him. It was enough to make 24 bag lunches. Ortiz lights up when he recalls, “That’s how we got started.”

The Elisha Project is named for the biblical prophet who dug a valley full of ditches in faith that they would fill up with life-saving water. It is the story Ortiz lives by: “Do what you can with what you have.” 

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“Storytelling is my passion,” says Ortiz, 

a talented photographer and filmmaker who has documented the Elisha Project from that first blog post. Even as his outreach efforts skyrocketed, he was inspired to go back to school through the Veteran Rapid Retraining Assistance Program (“I love being a student,” says multi-degreed Ortiz) to further his self-taught skills.

The university appealed to him for its experiential learning emphasis and inclusive community — “they meet students where they are,” he says — as well as for its longtime support of Elisha Project, where for years faculty chefs had donated time and leftover bakery goods. As a media communications major, Ortiz graduated magna cum laude. “He was one of the most contemplative students I have ever had,” says Christopher Westgate, Ph.D., a media and communication studies professor in the College of Arts & Sciences.  “His work was honest and thoughtful, and he encouraged his classmates to think critically.” Westgate was in the audience when Ortiz was honored by the Rhode Island Foundation with its 2023 Community Leadership Award last year. “I was so proud to see him accepting that award and being recognized for all the work he has done,” says Westgate. “He is a selfless person; he has given of his time, talent and treasure in so many ways.” 

This includes looking out for fellow Wildcats, through various collaborations between the university and Elisha Project over the years. Diane Riccitelli, director of off-campus student services, currently works with the Elisha Project to arrange for regular deliveries of hygiene and household products for any students that need them. “Our first shipment was almost 300 different types of products — deodorant, feminine products, detergents, soap, first aid kits — that students can grab off the shelves, no questions asked,” says Riccitelli, who coordinates with multiple JWU departments to distribute the shipments. “If students are worrying about meeting their basic needs, school becomes challenging. It’s important that we are able to help support them.” 

No-questions-asked is key for Ortiz, who has never forgotten the days when he was the one who needed help. Case in point: Saturday share markets, where hundreds of cars line up hours in advance to receive fresh foods and boxes of household and hygiene products. “Some people are averse to that, feeling like people are going to take advantage,” says Ortiz. “We will help anyone who has the audacity to ask.” The drive-through markets launched at the start of the pandemic, a period that tripled the Elisha Project’s growth. Realizing shutdowns would make it difficult for people to find help, Ortiz worked with Mayor Donald Grebien to set up a warehouse in the old Apex department store in Pawtucket, where he could receive and prepare shipments for distribution. The new space meant that Ortiz could go beyond food, and retail and wholesale giants such as Costco now send furniture, household goods or even appliances they can’t sell (Ortiz pays shipping) for the Elisha Project to donate to organizations that serve families in need, locally or afar. Among the millions helped by his efforts, fellow veterans and their families are an important part of the Elisha Project community. 

His ever-growing outreach is made possible by an army of volunteers, corporate partners and community advocates, but especially by his own family (he is now father of seven) and nearly 24-7 Elisha Project team.

This may only be the tip of the iceberg. “I’m a dreamer who executes,” says Ortiz. “Some people are always dreaming, never getting anything done. In my life, I’ve had to be the dreamer, the visionary and the grunt who got the work done.”  

Plot twist!

My focus isn’t on the person receiving the bag,” Ortiz says, referring to the brown bag lunches he still hands out every week. “My focus is on, how do we change the people handing out the bag? If we change those people, that’s how we solve food and housing insecurity.” 

This is one of the most powerful impacts of the Elisha Project. More than 125,000 volunteers have been part of the organization since its inception, a number always growing. You might find them singing along to Stevie Wonder while sorting items in the warehouse, or loading boxes into cars on a Saturday morning, all smiles, even in freezing rain. Many are regulars. “We serve the needy,” he says often. “We just don’t know on which side of the bag resides the needier person.”  

More than writing a check, he believes “skin in the game” is transformative. “Giving something with your own hands, that’s personal. That’s giving back.”

This is the ultimate story he tells through his work. “Some people don’t think they have anything to give, but your time is valuable, you are valuable,” Ortiz says. “Everyone, everyone has something valuable to give.”