by Lisa Reisman
Jeff Dorman knows the reality of spending month after month in a pediatric ward with a seriously ill child: the incessant beep of monitors, the hard couches, the cries from other rooms, the bright lights, the endless waiting. And the hunger: skipping meals that aren’t readily available to stay at the bedside of his daughter.
That’s how Dorman came to be waiting for 16 large pizzas, including one-gluten free, at Modern Apizza last Friday. With him was his business partner Michael Pollack. As they do each Friday, the two deliver the pizzas to 40 parents, children, and nurses at the Yale New Haven Children’s Hospital’s pediatric hematology/oncology floor and PICU units.
Marcus Harvin, founder of Newhallville Fresh Starts, was there too. The mission of the three is simple: Stamp out hunger in New Haven one slice, one plate of food, at a time. The bill was likewise simple. $0. As it does each Friday, Modern provides the pizzas free of charge.
“Modern was the first to do this,” said Dorman of Feeding Families Foundation, a nonprofit he and his wife Sam created as a way to feed the families of critically ill pediatric patients who don’t have easy access to regular meals as they care for their children.
Founded in September 2023, the nonprofit works with upwards of eight local restaurants—among them, Olmo, Haven Hot Chicken, and Nolo Pizza—each of which makes available meals that Dorman and his wife pick up and deliver directly to those families, regardless of financial need.
When his two-year-old was diagnosed with leukemia in 2022, “we learned the hospital provides meals for the child, but not the parents unless we purchase them, and that can add up,” Dorman said. “So you start skipping meals, and then you’re not at your best to advocate for your child’s care.” Once he and his wife Sam started the nonprofit, he said, “it became this giant magnet that’s brought like-minded people together.”
One of those was Pollack, a commercial artist and founder of the New Haven Pizza Club, which has as its mission to celebrate the rich tradition of New Haven pizza through Pollack’s prints, paintings, and sculptures; the most prominent is a giant pizza-slice sculpture made of steel and concrete that stands outside Modern Apizza.
In 2024, Pollack learned about Dorman’s Feeding Families Foundation, and an idea struck him. “New Haven pizza shouldn’t end with its global reputation,” he said, amid the cozy, coal-fired aroma wafting through the space. “We can harness it toward the good.” Soon he was auctioning off items from his studio in District NHV, using the proceeds to expand the reach of Feeding Families. He also called upon his network of pizza connections.
“Pick a day,” Pollack recalled Modern Apizza owner Billy Pustari telling him. “We’ll give pizza to those families every week for life.” They chose Fridays. Nolo’s Derek Bacon, he said, “asked when they could start and offered to deliver them himself.”
It was at a Wu Tang Wednesday at Nolo in September that Pollack first met Harvin; his father, Marcus “Marc Mecca” Carpenter, was deejaying there. Harvin told him about his nonprofit, Newhallville Fresh Starts, which repurposes excess food from area universities to feed anyone who’s hungry. Pollack told him about Dorman and his foundation.
“We have the same purpose,” said Dorman on Friday as he waited for the pies he and Pollack would deliver; he and his wife work with a charge nurse to coordinate the number of meals needed, as well as any food allergies to account for. “It might look different but the most important thing is that people who are hungry are getting fed.”
Sharing ideas at Nolo, with Fresh Starts team member Babatunde Akinjobi second from right.
The next stop was Nolo, where, after a brainstorming session, owner Derek Bacon met them with 19 pizza pies for Harvin and Adam Rawlings, a member of the Fresh Starts team, to deliver to the Life Haven women’s shelter and Surfside Veterans in West Haven.
“This is great, everybody together, especially right now, because this is absolute crisis time,” Bacon said; the following day, Nov. 1, SNAP benefits would lapse due to the government shutdown. “Hopefully other people in higher places will see the difference we can make by working together and multiplying our efforts.”
As Harvin was loading the boxes into his car in the Nolo parking lot, a man approached them.
“What is Feeding Families?” he asked; he had seen the logo on Dorman’s SUV as it was pulling onto State Street on its way to the hospital.
“They feed families in the hospital, we feed families in shelters, and people who are homeless, and now we are coming together to feed everyone that’s hungry,” Harvin answered.
“I’m from Romania,” the man said. “I did something similar there.”
“You wanna join us here?” Harvin asked him, his voice rising in excitement. “You see? This is how we change the world.”
Marcus Harvin, Jeff Dorman, Michael Pollack, and Adam Rawlings, teaming up at Modern Apizza to feed the hungry.