Episode 70: Jenna Bancroft (Director of Human Services, City of Watertown)

Meet Jenna Bancroft! She's the Director of Human Services for the City of Watertown, a new department in the city. In this conversation we talk about how when she was a teenager her family helped foster young kids and how that experience led her to want to get into a career to improve social services. We talk about her early work in Watertown at Wayside Youth & Family Support Network and how that direct work with people led her to want to step up in scope to try and affect things higher up. Then we dig into the new Human Services department in Watertown, how it quickly jumped in on issues such as food access and housing needs, why Watertown is a great community to work on these issues, and some of her thoughts on the future of the department and areas it might put their efforts. We also talk about the community food drive that is currently going on through the end of December, so be sure to click on the link below to see how you can help.

Released December 11th, 2025

(Click here to listen on streaming apps) (Full transcript below)

Visit the Human Services webpage

Community Food Drive: City's webpage and Watertown Community Foundation's webpage

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Transcript

Matt: 0:07

Hi there, welcome to the Little Local Conversations Podcast. I'm your host, Matt Hanna. Every episode I sit down for a conversation with someone in Watertown to discover the people, places, stories, and ideas of Watertown. This time I sat down with Jenna Bancroft, who is the Director of Human Services for the City of Watertown, which is a pretty new department in the city. So I’ll let her introduce herself and then we'll get into the conversation.

Jenna: 0:30

Okay, great. Well, my name is Jenna Bancroft. I am the Director of Human Services for the City of Watertown. Human Services is a brand new department for the city. I've been here for a little over four months now. I'm not completely new to Watertown. I was the Watertown Social Services Resource Specialist back in 2017 to 2020, and then found my way to Newton Health and Human Services and was very excited to see that the city was prioritizing human services for residents here. It's not every day that you see municipal government setting up a brand new department in any area, but especially in human services. And so that was very exciting to me, and I'm really happy to be back.

Matt: 1:16

Great. Well, we'll get into your current work. But first, I always like to go back and kind of get a little bit of your background, how you got interested in this work. So, first of all, are you from the area? Where do you come from?

Jenna: 1:27

I am not from the area. I'm originally from Indiana. So I'm far away is where I was born. A whole different kind of world and space in the Midwest. But I found my way down to Kentucky for my undergraduate. I could tell you a little bit about my obsession with college basketball from that time there, but.

Matt: 1:45

Can't avoid it.

Jenna: 1:47

Can't avoid it, exactly. And then I got into grad school at Boston College for social work. And I have some family out here. Initially, all of my family was from New Jersey. So I have some family that settled out here on the East Coast. And that's where I ended up for school. Met my husband, started a family, and we stayed out here.

Matt: 2:06

There you go. So, how about the work side of things? What made you interested in the social work side of things?

Jenna: 2:14

Yeah, it's a good question. It started when I was very young. So when I was a teenager, we, my family, I was an only child growing up, and my parents and I fostered six young girls for about two years. I was very different sharing my home and my parents and all of those things. But at an early age, it was an intro into, you know, different dynamics of families and how people live and the challenges that we all experience in different ways, especially for the girls that were with us, who we still, you know, keep in touch with some of them, some really tough stories with all of them. But they really struggled and the whole system was a little tricky to navigate. And even as a teenager, I remember thinking like there's gotta be a better way to do this, more supports for young people. And that got me on the track of therapy, clinical work. So I thought, I'm gonna be a child therapist. I'm gonna work with kids in that capacity. And I went to school for it. And I didn't want to do it for very long. So, you know, my path changed. I think I got out of school, you know, going to grad school at BC with a clinical track. I focused on youth and families. And I did a little bit of that work at Wayside when I was there, being the resource specialist as well. And I really enjoyed it, but I was finding that there were so many systemic issues and challenges with the public benefit systems and all of the different, you know, resources that we were trying to connect people with. And I wanted to have an impact on a broader level. So that's what brought me then to Newton, a municipal setting, which I think is so important to have human services, social service support there at the local level. And then now back here, trying to build the new department and figure out how it looks for Watertown is exciting, but that's where it where I started.

Matt: 4:14

Yeah. How about when you were at Wayside? Were there any, you know, without giving too many details, obviously. Were there any particular stories of, you know, something that illustrates that point of you needing to go further than the position you were in?

Jenna: 4:27

Yes. And the resource specialist position still exists for Watertown.

Matt: 4:32

I’ve had Sophia on. 

Jenna: 4:33

You've had Sophia. Sophia was an intern of mine when I was there. So it's really nice that full circle. But truly, almost every client that I worked with in that program, the best way to serve people is to have really open and honest conversations with them. And so a lot of those conversations revolved around, you know, these are really tricky, difficult systems to work within. So acknowledging that for people and then saying, and these are the resources that we have, and this is what we need to access. And, you know, apologizing on behalf of the systems that there's not much privacy for people, and we need to ask a lot of questions and get the information so that you can access these resources. But that didn't always sit well with me, how that process would go. So affordable housing and housing stability is a great example of that. The systems at play are hard to navigate. There are a lot of barriers, and there's not much housing in general that people can afford right now. And so helping people through that system is wonderful work and it's important work. And it can't stop there with just helping people navigate what exists right now. We need to be thinking a little bit more about, you know, how to create more housing, how to make it more affordable for people who really need it so that people can stay in our communities. And I think human services is a great space to be in, to be thinking about those things, not only how to help residents in the space that they are now and to stay in their homes, but also to think about how to grow the community in a way that really is accessible to more people, more residents, and help people stay here and thrive in this community.

Matt: 6:18

Yeah. Yeah. Affordable housing is obviously a big topic in this community. There are lots of people talking about that and trying to solve that puzzle. Let's hop back for a second, though. And you're so when you moved up to your Newton position, how did that change the way you could approach things with tackling these same issues?

Jenna: 6:37

So in Newton, there's a little bit different structure than the department here. So I was still really engaged in Newton with case management work. They do a lot of that work in-house in their health and human services department. So I was working directly with residents, I would say. You’d like to say that it was split fifty-fifty, but there’s so much need in all communities that the case management work was really heavy there. So it was a lot of direct service. But what I was able to focus on was more the prevention side of work. So doing some more of the substance use prevention, mental health events, and different services provided to the community, managed a few contracts there, similar to here with Wayside, but we worked with Riverside Community Care to offer a mobile crisis clinician that was just for the community. So there were a few different ways that we really addressed broader picture community needs through that department. So it was nice to be able to work with really, you know, what does the whole community need and how can we address those needs versus situations for people that need to be addressed, but they're really we're fixing problems in the short term and not thinking of long-term solutions to help people sustain. And so those are some of the, I don't have all the answers to that, but those are some of the thoughts around, you know, what kind of programs can we offer that are really going to help people get to a space where they can take care of themselves in this community too. And we're thinking about that here, trying to build those in.

Matt: 8:05

So you're able to expand your scope a little bit, slightly bigger picture. Maybe one thing we should do here too that we haven't done yet is, what is human services, right? Because people hear human services like that could be anything. What servicing a human, you know?

Jenna: 8:20

Yes. Sometimes people think human services is human resources, but we are not the same. So I really think of human services as truly touching every part of a person's life. And what this new department is trying to do is really address the base needs of community members. I think about the hierarchy of needs. And you can't really move on to the next phase unless your base needs are met first. So we think about affordable housing and food access. Those are some of the programs that we're working on currently. And then that higher level of belonging and engagement in your community and feeling like you can participate in events that are happening, volunteer to help your neighbors, those are components of human services as well. And so in our current human services department, we have programs that were already existing before my time here, of course. And they all really fit well with that model of, you know, taking care of our neighbors and then helping people to really engage and take care of one another. So the Watertown Food Pantry is one of the programs that falls under human services now, hitting that food access need for residents. The community wellness team falls under human services, and they offer a range of services to the community, including the farmers market, which touches on that food access component, and some really great wellness opportunities like free yoga classes and cooking classes and things that are going to help people, again, sustain and take care of their own wellness. And then our veteran service officer falls under human services as well, ADA coordinator, and we manage that contract with Wayside Social Services Resource Specialist Program. So we've got a lot happening within this little department, but that doesn't even touch all of the areas of human services. So another big component to the department and a big part of my job is really connecting all of the amazing services that already exist in Watertown through our nonprofits and other city departments like senior services and the library, trying to just coordinate everybody, that we're not working in silos, that we're really directing our efforts together to best serve the community.

Matt: 10:41

Yeah. So when you first came in, new department, kind of figuring things out, what was like your first few steps when you came in to tackle this new beast?

Jenna: 10:49

Well, I think finding ways to make all of those programs that existed in different spaces, the food pantry was a senior services program. The community wellness program was under planning and development. So making a cohesive department, which we're still working on and figuring out how to all jive together, that was some of the initial task, just getting everybody to know me and to know what the department can do. Those were the first few steps. But the world has other plans for that. You know, strategic planning sometimes has to wait when you need to address rising needs, the needs that are right in front of you. So a lot of our most recent efforts have really been put towards the government shutdown and the impacts of that on SNAP benefits for residents and food access. So I knew coming in, food access was going to be a big piece of this work and the human services department. I didn't know how quickly it would need to mobilize, but it did. It all came together very quickly. We were able to respond in a way. And this community is a true testament to Watertown. I think Watertown is the perfect community because it is small enough.

Matt: 12:04

You’re making us blush.

Jenna: 12:06

I know, right? I mean, it truly is. And I've had the opportunity to work in a couple different communities with different sizes, different access to resources. And Watertown is really unique. You know, it's small enough that there's such a community neighborhood feel and people want to be supporting. And it feels like there's this really nice relationship with local government here and community members and helping one another towards a common goal, which is refreshing and great. And, you know, we're big enough that there's some resources here too, that we can really do something with that momentum. And so, right away, four months in, we're getting a community food drive set up to support the Watertown Food Pantry, the Catholic Collaborative Food Pantry, and the fridge, which just moved, as some people know, I'm sure, to the library. And all of that in partnership with the Watertown Community Foundation. So I will also say that the first few months have been really about relationship building, not only within City Hall, but out into the community. I have met so many community leaders and partners, and everybody has been wonderful, you know, wanting to partner and think about the best ways to address needs and gaps in services that they're seeing. So it's been really nice to connect.

Matt: 13:21

Yeah, we have a strong group of community organizations for sure that help out. So why don't you take us through and going through organizing this food drive? How does the human services department help work all this together?

Jenna: 13:34

Sure. Well, we are a relatively small department at this point. So the community food drive was a, and is, a pretty big undertaking for a small department. So we were really thankful to the community foundation, Watertown Community Foundation, for assisting us in this. You know, they ran a food drive back in May, I think, and they had some of the understanding of how this could work. And so having that partnership was really helpful. But we've been hands-on through this whole community drive. So I'm picking up food at the library after we chat today so that I can bring it over to our storage site. We've really partnered with a lot of volunteer organizations in the area that will start to help us with sorting and distributing those items to the various sites that they're going to go to. And we know that this, you know, we could talk if we want to about all of the changes with SNAP and what we experienced over the last few weeks with kind of back and forth information on when people would get benefits. But this is not going to be a need that stops. The changes to SNAP eligibility are going to impact residents here. And so we are really thankful that we have this kind of backup supply of food and supports that's going to be available to residents when those needs start to hit, which will happen over the course of the next year.

Matt: 14:57

Right. Yeah. So do you wanna, I mean, it's I know it's early in your drive here, but do you want to talk about some of the success in that already?

Jenna: 15:04

Sure. Yes. We had early success. We put out food donation bins at all of the polling locations, and they filled at all of them. So we had a lot of food right away. We had probably, I'm thinking about our, I was there for our initial sorting and separation. So I want to say we had, I'm visualizing the bags of food in my mind right now, at least eight to 10 bags of food that would be things non-perishables, like cans of beans and soups and pastas and things like that, grains, for each of the food pantries. So nine to ten bags of additional food that they wouldn't have received otherwise, and some food for the community fridge to sustain. You know, the fridge is not always full. We would love for it to always be full. And so that's the intention with some of the extra food that we have now, too. And they keep coming in. We keep getting calls from our donation sites that we need to come pick it up because it's overflowing. So people really want to support. And that's not the only way that the community has been showing support. We have received incredible generosity from the community in monetary donations for the Watertown food pantry. I'm sure, I don't know because I don't receive those checks, but I'm sure the other food pantries receiving donations as well. It's just been, I mean, truly overwhelming. I think that again, that speaks to Watertown as a close-knit community that wants to help one another. I've had residents stop by, find me in my office, which I'm hard to find, and kind of hidden in City Hall, and give us a check for the food pantry. Somebody came by the other day and they said, we don't want to go get dinner until we stop by here and give you a check. That speaks so much to the spirit of Watertown.

Matt: 16:49

Yeah. And to get in maybe nitty-gritty on the numbers, you have numbers of how many people are affected by this and currently looking in the future with changes, you know.

Jenna: 17:00

We do. We do know how many families, at least as of September 2025, there were a little over 1,600 households that receive SNAP benefits. That's close to 2,500 individuals. A lot of SNAP recipients are seniors, people with disabilities, and children. So it impacts a big number of our community members. 

Matt: 17:24

I mean, that's getting close to 10%, right? 

Jenna: 17:26

Yeah, it is. It is. And from a national perspective, too, we've seen those numbers. You know, it's one in eight people across the whole country. And Massachusetts and Watertown is no exception. And those are the numbers of people that currently receive benefits. And you asked about what these changes could mean for the community. I don't have Watertown data on that because it gets pretty specific on eligibility guidelines. But what the state is expecting is that close to 50,000 people across the state could lose their benefits when it comes time for their recertification. And that also impacts people that haven't applied for SNAP before and they need the support, they might not qualify. So we're thinking, trying to think long-term about supports that we can do for Watertown residents, including, you know, expanding our food pantry. It's going to move to the Parker at some time soon. So that'll be information coming out when it's ready, but hoping to just provide more supports for people that need it, lower barriers than these programs that are offered through the state and the federal government. And just help people, you know, thrive so that they can move on and think about themselves, think about their own wellness and mental health and all of those things. People shouldn't have to worry about where they're getting their next meal.

Matt: 18:43

Yeah. And then they can contribute to the community too.

Jenna: 18:46

Exactly. 

Matt: 18:47

Yeah, and having the community fridge by the library sounds like a good idea too, because that gets much more high traffic than where it was. So how does your position, your new position in the city, this new department, talking about how we have all these organizations already in these departments, how does this new position heighten what we're able to do?

Jenna: 19:07

Well, I can, let's see, I'll try and give some examples of that. Some of the best resources that are in this community are the direct service providers that exist, I think. I'm a little biased because I used to be one. But, you know, Wayside's Social Service Resource Specialist Program, the schools have two outreach counselors for families. There's a clinician through the police department, and there's a caseworker at the senior center as well. There are just a lot of case management, kind of direct service providers that can work with residents to address these needs. But everybody does things a little bit differently. So one of the priorities for me in this role is to bring all those people together in a space. I forgot to mention our resident services team, who is wonderful at the Watertown Housing Authority as well. They've been in these conversations. But thinking about how we can offer a little bit more consistent services to residents so that, you know, if you go one place, you're getting the same kind of service that you could receive at another and how to really address needs from a community-wide perspective versus just the one place that you go to. So we have direct service meetings that are happening so that we can talk about the issues and what people are seeing in the community. And very soon I hope to have some working groups together for housing specific needs, food access, so that we can really be learning from our community leaders and experts in these areas, as well as residents. I would love to hear more from residents on what they're experiencing and then start to develop some more programming that can address those needs.

Matt: 20:44

Gotcha. So we talked about food a little bit. The other big one you're mentioning was housing. Do you want to talk a little bit about how you've kind of attacked that issue since joining on?

Jenna: 20:53

Well, I won't oversell what I've been able to do for housing thus far in four months. I will say it's a huge need. And I've talked with our Wayside clinicians and others through those direct service meetings. Nearly everyone that they work with has some issue with housing stability. Whether it's rent assistance or, you know, worried about sustaining into the future, you know, can I stay here, needing to find a new place, all of those things are issues across the board. Affordability is challenging. I have partnered with our Affordable Housing Trust and the Human Rights Commission to be a part of recent fair housing training sessions that were offered to the community. I think that's one step to start the conversation with landlords.

Matt: 21:41

Yeah, I was just gonna say, what is fair housing? 

Jenna: 21:44

Yes. So the fair housing laws really relate to how tenants are treated through the process of searching for housing and being in their homes. You know, how are their landlords and property managers and realtors treating them as they go through the process? And it's really important information, of course, for tenants to understand their rights. And it's important for landlords, property owners, realtors, to take a look at their current practices and make sure that it's aligning with what's appropriate for tenants and what's right for everyone. And so that has been nice. You know, we were able to put together some resources for tenants, not only for things like rental assistance and the fair housing laws, but then other supports, you know, knowing where to go in the community if you need help accessing services like food access and utility supports. They all overlap. So it's been good to connect in that way. But there's a lot more to do and think about when it comes to affordable housing. I do think the human services side in our department is really going to be more focused in a direct way on assistance for residents and for tenants. You know, that's really the space that I think we can live in from a direct service perspective, making sure that there's easy-to-access resources, whether it's through the website or print format and in languages that people need, in other accessible formats, that's a big priority of the department to make sure that people know where to go for help and to be a voice in those other conversations, you know, with the planning department, with community advocates related to housing. What are we seeing? What are direct service providers experiencing for residents in the community and being able to share those stories.

Matt: 23:28

Yeah. So I'm a little curious about how your conversations with the landlords went. You know, I feel like they could feel like they're being attacked in some of these conversations, but obviously we want to work with them in a collaborative way, you know.

Jenna: 23:38

Sure. I have to say I'm not sure what the attendance was. That session was offered hybrid, and I was more of an attendee, and were getting the resources together for them. But really the intention and some of the messaging that I would like to come from human services when it comes to interacting with landlords and property managers and brokers, is that when we take care of tenants and the people that are living under your roofs, everybody wins. I think that's really true. You know, there's a lot of ways that landlords especially, and property owners can support their tenants to make sure that everybody gets what they need. You know, it's a relationship that needs to remain intact. And so that's the message that the human service side of things is trying to push out, that you can support your tenants with a variety of needs that they might have. And there are resources that can benefit everyone, whether it comes to rental assistance or encouraging landlords and property owners to rent to lower income residents, that there's a lot of benefits to that. You know, someone who has a voucher, there's guaranteed income there. And there's I could go on and on about some of those benefits, and we just hope that it's a conversation that the community wants to have and we can continue having.

Matt: 24:48

Yeah. There are obviously is a large group of people in town that understand this, and there's always education and ways we can learn, but what is the benefit to having some of these lower income people in our community or having other issues? What is the benefit to having them in our community?

Jenna: 25:04

Well, I think that a community. Here's what I think. When a community really serves its lowest income residents, its highest need residents, everyone benefits. Because if there are systems in place and services in place that are going to help the highest need, they're going to help everyone that's here. That really brings a community together as well. And then, you know, it speaks to this like hierarchy of needs that I talked about earlier, that meeting base needs, I mean, that's a given, I think. We need to be always working to do that. And hopefully we'll get there where we can think even more about the ways that the community can engage. But when you're connecting with people that think differently than you, that experience things differently than you, it's, I'm of the opinion, that that's good for everybody and it's good for the community. And it helps us grow because it helps us think about what kind of services are really going to benefit everyone who lives here and just help foster those connections and build a community that feels really close and together.

Matt: 26:09

Yeah. And do you have any, I know you've only been here a few months, do you have any stories, particular success stories of like a personal story, again, without sharing too much information, of just someone who is positively impacted by some of these programs or services? And because those stories always help people visualize the work, you know.

Jenna: 26:28

They do, I know. And I have not had as much direct experience with residents thus far in this job. I used to very much. So I'm wondering about some people that I've connected with in my previous life here in Watertown. I think a really big success story, and not to exclusively talk about the food drive and the response to food access, but that was just an incredible mobilization of resources and services. And there are a lot of families I know who have come to the residence services at the housing authority or to the Wayside resource specialists and the case managers at the senior center and say, I don't know what's happening with my food access. I don't know what's happening with my SNAP benefits. I'm gonna have to make challenging decisions this month if they don't come through. And I think we were able to minimize that in a way. And there's still going to be impacts. So that's really the hope is that we can minimize those impacts as much as possible. And the community is just responding to that. You know, it's not every community is gonna have people in it that are thinking about their neighbors in the way that Watertown does. I'm just really, I'm really excited to be here. I have to say. It's a great community in that way. And so I'm really excited about some of the overlap with the programs that fall under the human services department related to the SNAP need and, you know, looking at really belonging and sustainability for residents as well. So our resident services team at the Watertown Housing Authority has partnered with the community wellness team to offer, and they did this last night, they offered some cooking classes using recipes that use ingredients that you could get at the food pantry. So some black beans, chickpeas, some grains and other, you know, produce that you can get at our Watertown food pantries for free. And so bridging that gap of it's not only about where can I find my next meal. It's how can I use this, these resources, to create something really nice for my family and something that we can share together, you know, in the community. And that class also brought people together. So it's a nice overlap. And what I think human services can and will do into the future is really bringing people together while addressing those needs.

Matt: 28:53

Yeah. So what other parts of your role haven’t we talked about? Like what behind-the-scenes stuff that people might not know is involved with this?

Jenna: 29:01

The relationship building in the community is probably the biggest thing that I can think of that isn't going to be so visible to community members, but I have a lot of conversations with nonprofits and community members to really get a better sense of what people are seeing in the community and what should be the priorities for the human services department. A lot of things that have come out of those conversations, of course, are things that we would think of, like the housing stability and the food access that we've talked about. But there are other needs that have come up speaking with, you know, members of the school committee and other residents who are parents. Child care is another topic that's high on people's minds. Employment and mental health services and substance use as well. We manage the Watertown Cares Network. So there's a lot of conversations happening behind the scenes. I would want to communicate that to the community that you'll see a lot come out, I think, from human services immediately that relates to housing stability and food access, because those are really, really big basic needs that people need to have met. And there are a lot of other conversations happening to think about how to really address like a holistic wellness for residents here in the community.

Matt: 30:21

So let's look to forward-facing thoughts then. So, what are you hoping for in the future with this position and human services in Watertown?

Jenna: 30:30

Well, I'm really looking forward to getting some groups together to discuss those bigger needs and think about prevention programming that we can put in place. I've been thinking a lot about housing stability in general. Spoke earlier about some of those resources. I think that we can be a real resource hub for the community. Different communities like Boston and Cambridge and other spaces have departments for those needs. And I think that there's a lot of ways that we can address all the different resource points, you know, having more education in the community about accessing affordable housing, how to get supports with upfront costs and other fees that are associated with that, how to navigate fair housing law, those kinds of things. I think all can fall under this department in some sort of way, whether it's referrals out or really maximizing resources that exist in the community now. And I think that's true too with the food access components. I'm hoping to have a mobile food opportunity. I'll put it that way, because we're not sure. 

Matt: 31:33

Bookmobile slash food mobile.

Jenna: 31:34

Yes, not sure how it'll look exactly yet, but hoping to just make the food pantry services and other food access like the farmers market and those kind of opportunities just more accessible to everyone. Because there's, I think, a lot of working families where the times don't necessarily work out for them. So we're thinking those things through. I'm really excited about those opportunities to make these services that exist now in the middle of the day, you know, at times that are really beneficial to a lot of residents, but aren't so accessible to others, try and expand those opportunities. And really looking forward to having a comprehensive resource database for residents. So that's something that's been happening behind the scenes that has a little bit of a slow rollout. People can see on the human services spot on the Watertown website that there is already some information about housing stability and food access, the theme of my conversation today. But there will be more to come. I really hope that people will be able to look to the city, to the human services department as a space where they can get all of the information they might need about what happens here in Watertown and what services they can access.

Matt: 32:45

Yeah, the pros and cons of having a lot of resources is putting it all together is a lot of work.

Jenna: 32:50

Definitely. And keeping them updated is really important too. So that's a lot of the behind-the-scenes work on how can we do that, making sure that it's really a resource that works for everyone too. Everybody needs their information in different ways. You know, sometimes it needs to be on a website and easily accessible for a self-service model, but other people really want to sit down and talk to you about how those resources look. So we're thinking about all those different formats that people want or need their information in and trying to get it out there in a variety of ways.

Matt: 33:22

Yeah. What has been the hardest segment of the population to reach for you?

Jenna: 33:27

That's a good question. I think a lot of residents are hard to reach, to be honest, because people are always, they're living their lives, you know? So how do you present this in a way that's going to be easy for people to navigate? For me right now, thinking about the programs that we already have in place, it's working families that are difficult to reach. So people who are busy during the day and they have families at night that they're taking care of. I would love to offer more supports in like a stress management side of resources, but I don't want to make accessing those resources even more stressful. So trying to navigate that piece is difficult. And that's where a lot of really great partnerships come into place, like with the schools and some after-school opportunities, things like that.

Matt: 34:14

Right. Right. Well, I think we've gotten a good overview here for people. Maybe give a little more information since the food drive is should still be going on when this comes out because it's going all the way through December, right?

Jenna: 34:25

It is. 

Matt: 34:26

So do you want to give a little more information about how people can get involved with that?

Jenna: 34:30

Sure. Yes. So the community food drive is running through the end of December. We know that this is a time, you know, when people will need a little extra support, even aside from some of the bigger picture challenges that we're experiencing. It's the holiday season, you know, so people need some extra support as they spend their funds on other things for their families. And so that's going to run through the end of December. And if people would like to get involved, donation sites are still going to be available at all of the schools through the end of December, as well as the Watertown Free Library, City Hall, the police station, and the East End Fire Station. All of those locations will still have drop-off points for non-perishable items. People are welcome to donate to the community fridge, any other items that they would like to that need to be kept in a refrigerator and that will be frequented by families, I'm sure. And then if you would like to donate monetarily, the food pantries would greatly appreciate that. It allows them to purchase items that they need when they need it, even things like hygiene items and other care items. They're able to use those funds in a way that serves their clients best.

Matt: 35:45

Yeah. Great. Well, was there any other last thoughts you want to put out there? Anything um Kentucky basketball related?

Jenna: 35:52

Yeah. I know, I wondered how deep we'd get into, you know, my personal background. I mean, I went to Kentucky, I was there when they won a national championship. And so now into the future, anytime I fill out, you know, a bracket, March Madness, I can't do it without Kentucky winning, which has not been beneficial for me in recent years. But yeah, it's just, I love it.

Matt: 36:17

Yeah. Nice. Well, if people do want to reach out to you, where should they go?

Jenna: 36:21

They should go to the human services website. It's watertown-ma.gov slash human services. My information is there. I am always available for a phone call or an email. I would love to hear from the community on what they're experiencing and what they would want from this new department.

Matt: 36:38

Great. Well, thanks for taking the time to sit down and share your thoughts and stories. And yeah.

Jenna: 36:43

Thank you.

Matt: 36:44

So that's it for my conversation with Jenna. I'll put links in the show notes so you can find the city's website for the department, the community food drive that's going on. And if you'd like to hear more of these episodes, you can head on over to the podcast website, Little Local Conversations.com. There you can find all the episodes, events coming up, which I am taking a January break for events, but I'll be back at it in February. And also you can sign up for my weekly newsletter there to keep up to date with everything going on. And if you'd like to help support the podcast, there's also a support local conversations button in the menu where you can become a little local friend to help support the podcast and keep these conversations going. Alright, and I want to give a few shout-outs here to wrap things up. First one goes to podcast sponsor, Arsenal Financial, which is a financial planning business here in Watertown that's owned by Doug Orifice. He's a very committed community member, involved with various nonprofits and groups in the city, and his business helps busy families, small businesses, and people close to retirement. So if you need help in any of those areas, reach out to Doug and his team at arsenalfinancial.com. I also want to give a thank you to the Watertown Cultural Council who have given me a grant this year to help support the podcast so I want to give them the appropriate credit, which is, this program is supported in part by a grant from the Watertown Cultural Council, a local agency, which is supported by the Mass Cultural Council, a state agency. You can find out more about them at watertownculturalcouncil.org and massculturalcouncil.org. And a couple more shout-outs to promotional partners. First one goes to the Watertown Business Coalition, they’re a nonprofit organization here in Watertown, and their motto is Community Is Our Business. Find out more about them at Watertown Business Coalition.com. And lastly, Watertown News, which is a Watertown focused online newspaper by Charlie Breitrose here in the city. It's a great resource and a great place to keep up to date with everything going on. Go check that out at WatertownMANews.com. So that's it. Until next time, take care.