Summer brings pressure to food pantries
Date: 7/25/2012
By G. Michael Dobbs
news@thereminder.comGREATER SPRINGFIELD — Peanut butter, canned tuna and spaghetti sauce are three common food items that local emergency food services need at this time of year.
"The hunger community is in crisis," Holly Farrar, the director of the Community Survival Center, said.
Three area emergency food services are appealing to the public for help to fill their depleted shelves.
The Open Pantry Emergency Food Pantry — serving Springfield — closed its doors on July 13 due to a lack of food to offer people. It re-opened on July 16 after an influx of donations.
Program Director Candace Larger explained to
Reminder Publications the organization was forced to close its doors because it needed to preserve its diminished stocks for its distribution for senior citizens.
The response to the closing yielded enough donations to keep Open Pantry stocked for three weeks, she added.
Both Larger and Farrar said for emergency food service organizations there is a "constant struggle."
"Summer is always very difficult," Larger said. "Economically it's been just so rough in this area."
Margaret's Pantry and Kate's Kitchen in Holyoke was also on the brink of closing last week as well, according to a press statement from Karen Blanchard, executive director of Providence Ministries for the Needy. The shelves at the Community Survival Center, which serves Indians Orchard, Ludlow and Wilbraham, also need re-stocking.
Blanchard wrote, "More and more individuals/families are accessing our two programs, and unfortunately the food we are allotted via Massachusetts Emergency Food Assistance Program and the United States Department of Agriculture via the Western Mass. Food Bank has been drastically cut. These two factors have left our pantry shelves quite bare as of late."
Larger concurred the cuts from these sources of food have hurt local programs.
Farrar said the problem has been increased demand for services. At the Community Survival Center, 148,000 pounds of food was donated during the fiscal year that juts ended, a record amount. Unfortunately there was increased demand.
"They cancelled each other out," she said.
Farrar said that food pantries were designed to supply families with food during temporary emergencies. At her pantry, qualified families can go six times a year and receive a four-day supply of food.
She said to understand what is happening in the area, one should "take out the word 'temporary' and take our the word 'emergency'." More and more people, Farrar added are using the food pantries as part of their regular means of feeding themselves.
Although local food organizations were the recipients of donations through the "Stamp Put Hunger" food drive organized by letter carriers, Larger said those donations were depleted by the third week of June.
Blanchard has called for donations of peanut butter, rice, meals in a can, Hamburger Helper, beans, tuna fish, canned vegetables and fruit, drink mixes, cake mixes, cereals, tomato sauce/paste, soups and canned hams, which may be brought to Margaret's Pantry located on the side entrance of 56 Cabot St. in Holyoke Monday through Thursday 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., or to Kate's Kitchen in the rear of 51 Hamilton St. in Holyoke seven days a week from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Donations to the Open Pantry may be made to 2460 Main St. in Springfield in Suite 108 and 108B in the Plaza Del Mercado from 9 a.m. to 3p.m. on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Larger said the pantry can't keep peanut butter in stock.
The Community Survival Center is located at 240 Main St. Indian Orchard and accepts donations Monday through Friday from 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. and until 5 p.m. on Thursdays.
