This year, we provided physical food pantry cupboards to Newport High School and Alternative School (PORS) and Cusick High and Middle Schools in March.
We filled these every week with shelf stable food to include chili, noodle soups, fruit leathers, trail mix, instant oatmeal, milk, granola bars and chili. During the summer months, these bags are left at each town’s local library, in partnership with the Pend Oreille Public County Library District. This is in addition to providing weekend food stuffs for up to 109 young people every week during the school year.
Our Drop-in Center has a food pantry, and we partnered with Second Harvest to receive fresh produce occasionally to add to our food offerings to families with children that come to the center each week to pick up their bags. Service provision of food, basic essentials, clothing, etc., has increased 20% this operating year and especially in the 2nd quarter. Increased need and costs associated with food, fuel, utilities and housing have risen quickly.
We are finding it harder to locate food in bulk and are limited in amounts of cases of non-perishable food we are allowed to buy, secondary to a reduction in food availability and high demand from others. This is certainly related to the supply line crisis but also to the enduring effect of the pandemic.
In order to respond to our rising food costs, we reduced the number of items in each bag and completely discontinued yogurt, cheese and frozen foods.
During the last two quarters we provided 1,371 food bags, pantry items and extras boxes for families with multiple children. This is compared to the first two quarters when we offered zero pantry items to schools and provided 875 weekend food bags.