[cauterized]

Yup, communication and facilitation are great places to start for a lot of these social challenges.

As for the rest: I'm aware of at least one very effective NGO in NYC whose mission is just such food distribution. The organization is called City Harvest, and I'm sure that a) it could use fresh new ideas and technical initiatives, and b) organizations in other cities could learn a lot by copying their model and learning how they handle the legal and logistical challenges.