Local non-profit also planning first-ever Miami County Pride event July 25
It was the federal government shutdown in November 2025, which delayed distribution of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits nationwide, that first led Heather Rocco to start the One Small Act Meal-in-a-Bag program in her home garage.
“I’ve been in community organizing for 30 years,” Rocco said. “Every organization I worked with was doing a great job, but it felt like they were identifying the problem for the community, instead of actually asking the community what they needed. So, I started asking people, what is it that you need?”
“What I found is that people could get to food pantries sometimes, but they often didn’t have reliable transportation to do so, or they would have one car per family, so they would end up losing out on that monthly run to the food pantry because they couldn’t get there,” she said.
President of the One Small Act nonprofit organization, Rocco was motivated to create the Meal-in-a-Bag program, which has now completed over 500 deliveries, providing a nutritious, non-perishable meal and a recipe card each Sunday to local families in need.
Currently serving 25 families per week, the program will expand in June to serve 35 families each week.
“We’ve done over 500 deliveries since November of last year,” Rocco said. “We have grants to expand to 35 families per week, so we’ll be doing that in June.”
The Meal-in-a-Bag program is available to residents of Miami County, regardless of income.
“We don’t have income requirements,” Rocco said. “The only requirement is that you live within Miami County.”
County residents can sign up for meals through a link on the One Small Act website, Facebook and Instagram, starting at 12 p.m. each Sunday.
“Every Sunday at noon, our list opens up,” Rocco said. “It goes until it fills up, which sometimes is in an hour, and sometimes is in a few hours.”
Located inside the Stouder Center at 1100 Wayne Street, One Small Act also recently participated in a national program called the American Empathy Project, packing and distributing 100 meals in one day.
“That was a really cool thing to be a part of,” Rocco said. “That was funded by the American Humanist Association; they picked 101 people out of 600 applicants.”
The Meal-in-a-Bag program is funded by grants from The Impact Award and the Miami County Foundation, as well as private donations.
“When I started it, I self-funded the whole program,” Rocco said. “We’ve been lucky to get a lot of generous donations through the community, and different fundraisers that have been done for us as well.”
Donations of food are also accepted at One Small Act, and at Designs From the Grove. A list of requested food items can be found on the One Small Act website www. onesmallactmiamicounty.org.
Before the Meal-in-a-Bag program, One Small Act was already known for organizing local community events, including outdoor movies and events serving free food to the community. The organization also offers several other programs, including the Vintage Voices creative writing program for seniors and the Page Against the Machine Book Club.
“It is growing very fast,” Rocco said. “We try to create community programs that the community wants. We go out into the community and talk to people, and ask what they feel is missing.”
Other programs include the Adopt-a-Senior program, and Every Senior Seen, which offers free professional portraits for 10 local high school seniors provided by Studio 50 in Tipp City.
“That was Studio 50 in Tipp City,” Rocco said. “That was his idea. We’re going to do another one in the fall.”
One Small Act also formed the Belong Miami County group, which offers a welcoming community for LGBTQ individuals and allies, and is currently planning to host a first-of-its-kind Pride event which will be held on Saturday, July 25.
“We are really focused on creating a safe space for the LGBTQ community in Miami County,” Rocco said. “We’ve had a lot of people reach out to us and say they don’t feel like they have anywhere to go, so we’re actually organizing the first Pride in Miami County happening in July.
“It will be here at our location,” she said. “It’s going to be historic; it will be the first one.”
“Everyone belongs here,” Rocco said. “That’s why we have the Belong Miami County group; that’s why it’s called that, because we want everyone to realize they belong here.”