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Date: 8/16/2023
SOUTHWICK — With absolutely no fanfare, ground was broken Aug. 10 on the construction of a new facility for the Our Community Food Pantry.
“We’re not about fanfare,” said Joe Deedy when asked why there wasn’t a formal groundbreaking for the new facility that will be less than 100 feet where the food pantry is currently operating at 222 College Hwy., Southwick, in a ranch-style house on the grounds of a former church.
There was a groundbreaking, of sorts, when a crew with Southwick’s Crestview Construction Inc. arrived, in a light rain, at the site of the new facility with excavation equipment and began digging the rectangle-shaped trench for the foundation.
“There were here until 7 [p.m.] in the rain … still working,” Deedy said of the Crestview Construction crew.
With the trench completed, on Aug. 11, Deedy and Jim Comee, who is a principal with Southwick’s Chet Comee & Sons Concrete, were standing in the dark red dirt of the trench building frames where the concrete will be poured for the foundation’s footing.
Neither put down their hammers as they took a quick break to talk about the project.
Using his hammer, Comee pointed to the long side of the trench and said by the end of the day the walls would be installed. Deedy pointed skyward with his hammer.
“Within two weeks we’ll have the roof on,” he said.
That drive to get it done as soon as possible started only months after Deedy, as president of the Southwick Civic Fund, purchased the property of the former Christ United Methodist Church, which closed its doors in June 2022 after 206 years. The property included the church, a hall, and the former residence where the food pantry is housed.
Within two months, Deedy announced he wanted to move the food pantry operations into the church’s former fellowship hall. It was an endeavor he and Sally Munson, the pantry’s director, had been talking about for over a decade.
Their plans hit a snag. After a thorough inspection of the building, Deedy found the space wouldn’t work for the pantry operation. He changed gears and decided to build a new 1,800-square-foot facility on the north side of the hall.
But the project needed a funding source. With the blessing of the pantry’s board of directors, he reached out to state Sen. Paul Mark (D-Becket) and state Rep. Nicholas Boldyga (R-Southwick) and asked for help. They came through with a $150,000 state grant four months later in September 2022.
Plans were drawn up and in June Deedy got the blessing of the town’s Planning Board and a building permit. Since then, the Civic Fund has been forging ahead with the project.
Two weeks ago, the contractors who have pledged to help met to map out the “game plan” for the project, Deedy said.
Despite all of them being exceptionally busy, caused in part by the nearly unrelenting rain that has fallen over the last two months, all reconfirmed their commitment to getting it done before the temperatures drop in late fall.
The contractors involved are:
While nearly everything needed to bring the project to completion has been pledged, Deedy said he’s still hoping to find a contractor or supplier that can provide the doors and windows needed. He is also hoping to find someone who can apply epoxy on the facility’s concrete floors.
He said the Southwick Civic Fund and the food pantry won’t turn down any financial donations, as well.
The food pantry has for years operated out of a converted single-family home. The main reason the pantry needs the extra space is the “enormous” increase in need over the past two years, said Munson, adding that it now serves over 100 families from Southwick, Tolland and Granville.
She said previously that the pantry volunteers have been seeing at least 10 new families each month needing assistance and nearly all are “working families.”