Food pantry use surges (More working people need help)

[ckramer]

Source: BH

When Eileen O’Shea recently visited the St. Francis House, she noticed people in suits and business attire entering the soup kitchen at the Boston homeless day shelter to eat lunch.

More and more working and so-called middle-class people are seeking relief from food pantries and soup kitchens, as rising food and heating oil prices, the higher costs of gasoline and medicine, and the mortgage crisis squeeze their household budgets.

“Our food pantries are telling us that they’re seeing an increase in the number of working people who are in need of assistance,” O’Shea said. “They’re definitely having problems making ends meet. Every year this time of year we see an increase, but this year, there’s more of an increase.”

“It’s working-class people that no longer have a job,” Pye said. “Builders aren’t building, so they don’t need plumbers, they don’t need electricians, they don’t need painters, they don’t need carpenters. And when their unemployment runs out, what do they do? They come to the food pantry - reluctantly most of them.”

Read more: http://www.bostonherald.com/business/general/view.bg?articleid=1079124

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[Skittles]

1. I helped a neighbor with grocery costs

she's a working single mother just getting squeezed by all the extra costs

[Maat]

2. This is SO true.

The food pantry at a sister church of ours went from helping a few families to helping over 200 (and this has been within the last several months, per my recollection). I've been helping the whole effort as much as I can!

[FirstLight]

3. I am right there ...

We are borderline in SO many ways, these days. I haven't had to apply for aid (yet) beacuse my church, and family have been eeeking us through... but what happens when they too are feeling this?
(they stil think I am nuts when I say it is TIME to grow for ourselves and get off the grid...)

The food pantry here is having a hard time keeping food on the shelves, our church has stepped up efforts as well here...

[Lorien]

4. I was wondering- has anyone here ever tried to round up food

from grocery stores, bakeries, restaurants, etc that's about to be dumped? I shop at my grocery right before they close at night, and I'm often there when produce and bakery items are being loaded up for disposal. I've never asked what happens to all that food, but it seems like if it's not going to a food pantry, it should.

Has anyone here ever approached such establishments about this?

[Lydia Leftcoast]

5. Sometimes they do donate their leftovers

For example, I was just at my church's Sunday supper program, and the one source that I know for sure (I'm not involved in administering the program, just in serving meals) is that a local bakery gives us its day-old pastries to serve with the meal and day-old bread rolls for the patrons to take with them as they leave. We usually have fruit for them to take along as well, but I don't know where it comes from. Since many, although not all, of the patrons are homeless, rolls and fruit are the most portable take-out items.

Today we had a special donation drive for a food shelf that the downtown churches in Minneapolis run cooperatively. We were told that each $10 contribution provides $100 worth of food, so they must be getting surplus groceries from somewhere.

By the way, today so many people came to eat that we had to have "overflow seating" for the family section. Normally, we have four tables in a separate room for families with children, but today, we had to open another room.

Although everyone got "firsts," there wasn't enough to give everyone seconds.

[laylah]

8. Good morning, Lorien.

I have approached grocers and schools re: left-over foods. Because of state Health Department rules in Colorado, they cannot donate the food, and now, they are even locking outdoor trash bins to keep the homeless from rooting through them for food! As for school, at least here in my area, the left-over lunches are donated to a local soup kitchen.

[Lorien]

16. Thanks laylah. Yeah, that's what I was afraid of

It's illegal here in Orlando to feed the homeless (what a "christian" law, eh?) but a person can still donate to soup kitchens. I know that a lot of places lock their dumpsters here, too. It just seems completely insane to me.I know how to freshen up day old bread, and I'll usually use eggs a day or two after their sell by date-if it's between that and starving??? So much goes to waste in this country. There's got to be a way to get "imperfect" products that will still give healthy nourishment to the hungry-times are really getting desperate. i guess that the first thing I should do is call up the soup kitchen and ask them what's possible.

[NYPat]

9. There are organized programs in some areas

In our area we have Food Shuttle of Western NY. They organize volunteer drivers to pick up surplus food from grocery stores, bakeries, restaurants, and shopping clubs. They deliver it to food pantries, soup kitchens, and low income senior housing. They make a huge difference but the need is ever larger.
http://www.stgregs.org/parish.php?pcode=outreach_fs

[JPZenger]

17. Even Starbucks Donates to Our Food Pantry

The local Starbucks donates their slightly outdated coffee to the local food distribution center. The pantry has their own coffee bean grinder, which was also donated. I kind of questioned it, because it is not really nutritional, but they say if its free - why not give it away.

[AlertLurker]

14. Many cannot donate due to local health regulations.

There are some goods that you can usually get them to donate, however (if you try hard enough). Sometimes, canned goods get dented, or labels come off, or water drippings make labels on some products unsightly. Talk to (browbeat, if necessary) the manager of your local grocery store and hook him up with your local food bank.

Good luck.

[JPZenger]

19. Dollar stores have caused cut back on donations

The rise in dollar stores has actually cut back on donations to food pantries. Companies used to donate their discontinued and overstocked items to the food pantries. Now, they sell them to the dollar store chains.

[SoCalDem]

27. Our son donated the extra food from their wedding reception

to a church that feeds poor people..and the flowers too (their wedding was at the same place)

They paid for x amount of food and of course they got extra :)

[AngryOldDem]

20. In my experience, many stores/restaurants are aware and donate their food.

Panera Bread (are they national?) is very good at donating leftover bagels, loaves, rolls, etc.

Plus, we have a donor who goes to Kroger and gets all the bread, cakes, pies, doughnuts, etc., that are marked down for quick sale. If you are interested, why not ask them if you could just take the stuff that's headed for the Dumpster, and then drop it off at a shelter or food bank?

Actually, we have an abundance of food from these sources....sometimes too much to know what to do with it all! But that is a good thing.

Folks, one more thing. Summer's coming. Typically that's when food banks hit their crisis level. Keep that in mind as the weather warms.

[Lorien]

21. Well, I was thinking of just asking them, but I wanted to know about

others experiences first, just to get a good idea about the best way to approach it. I think I'll call the shelter first and ask them who already donates in the area and what restrictions the health department imposes. After that, I'll try to get creative and approach the places that aren't donating. I live in the downtown area of a mid sized city, so there's a lot of places to choose from here. But since my time is so limited due to my job I want to use it as wisely and effectively as possible.

[MissB]

22. There was a profile in our local paper a few months back of a woman that did just that.

She basically ran a food pantry right out of her garage. She had donated freezers and refrigerators and very few rules for who could pick up food.

[superkia]

24. I worked for Panera bread for a short time and they bag all of...

their unsold bread and give it away to anyone that sets it up with them. I know allot of churches came by in the early mornings to pick it all up. All of their breads are made daily so anything not sold is given away.

[SoCalDem]

26. Most of them fear lawsuits so they destroy it

Our store used to donate bread..but that was all.. They had to open all dairy & dump it and packaged meats etc..

[rucky]

6. The heating bills are out of control.

I mean absolutely fucking ridiculous. I don't know how we do it, much less anybody else.

[sarcasmo]

7. Working poor, "that's uniquely american" This country is closer to ruin than most realize.

Kick and Nom.

[rpannier]

10. I live in east Asia and lived in the Czech Rep in 1994-5

Trust me...
Working poor is not uniquely American

It's everywhere

[tanyev]

11. Another surge brought to you by the Bush administration.

[namvet73]

12. "Bushie, you're doing a heck of a job!"

...welcome to the 1930s!

[Liberal Jesus Freak]

13. Shelters are full, too.

My husband and I manage a homeless shelter with a capacity of 50. We have been at capacity for weeks and have a waiting list for the family units. Most of our residents are out-of-work or under-employed carpenters, painters, etc. We serve three meals a day and are fortunate to receive as many donations as we do. I have noticed that calls from churches and other organizations are increasing, asking us for food/meal donations. When we opened last year, our goal was to eventually serve the public as a soup kitchen, also. Eventually is now.

[happygoluckytoyou]

15. GOP Do-Nothing Congress.... Trillions for WAR... Nothing for POOR

WHENEVER I HEAR "TAXES ARE BAD".... I THINK.... WEALTH LEVELING IS GOOD !!!

i know... so socialist... and that is how the DEVIL GOP fools you...

the wealthy put labels on any attempt to "bring them down" and "level the $ playing field"

---HERE IS THE BIG NEWS... taxes are great!!!!!
-------------taxes helped neighborhood kids play ball at a park
-----------read at a library
--------get medical attention at a hospital
-----get food to the hungry, heating oil to the poor and elderly

--------------THE BIGGER THE TAXES TO THE WEALTHY... the more for the rest of us...

-----------------------and isn't THAT they rule of THEIR game!!!!

[brentspeak]

18. Tax cuts for the rich, America's manufacturing sent overseas,

banking deregulation, an Ayn Rand follower as the Federal Reserve chairman, a completely useless war that's costing us billions a day -- the result was always inevitable.

[OKthatsIT]

25. And THAT Ayn Rand follower was recently in Saudi Arabia

telling the Royals..to dump their dollars. And the follower isssssssss, Alan Greesnpan.

Should we talk about the Club of Rome, now?

[KamaAina]

23. Did somebody say "surge"?

:P

Seriously, though, all the money we're pouring down the rat hole of that other "surge" is what's wrecking the economy so that so many people have to go to food pantries. Thanks for nothing, Bush**! :grr: