Loaves 'n Fishes Food Pantry is nestled in a grassy dip at the south side of The Ridge Community Church gravel parking lot in Pea Ridge. The neat and tidy gray building with white trim looks like it might once have been a shop or garage. (It was the barn in which the Pea Ridge Graphic was published for years.)
Inside the building, along with all the other appliances necessary for such an operation, are two shiny new metal-clad industrial refrigerators purchased with the proceeds of a grant.
9 to 11 a.m. Tuesdays and Thursdays
4-6 p.m. on first and third Wednesdays
Pantry manager Debra Calvert said she and Cindy Anthony attended a grant writing class offered by Northwest Arkansas Food Bank in 2016. As part of the class, attendees were encouraged to write a proposal for a grant of $6,000 sponsored by Walmart. Calvert beamed with pride, her smile broad, when she talked about it. She said, "Our grant won!"
The money allowed her to purchase not only the two refrigerators but also shelving for food storage and distribution, heavy duty storage totes, other storage items and a metal container like the ones seen on container ships. Calvert said she spent all but $3 of the grant money.
The metal storage container, which Calvert calls a Con-X, allows the pantry to store foods and other items away from insects, rodents and vandals. In the Con-X, Calvert pointed to shelves packed with items she said will be given to families to use as Christmas presents. She said the pantry buys these gift items as well as toiletries and housewares from United Way.
She explained that the pantry also buys meat from the Walmart Neighborhood Market, Harps and other stores at nine cents a pound. She said the pantry goes through 1,600 pounds of chicken a month. Calvert pulled up the lids of freezers full of both pre-cooked and fresh frozen meats, all neatly packaged into one-gallon plastic freezer bags. Each freezer has an itemized list of its contents and the dates received, and Calvert said volunteers rotate through them regularly so that all food is as fresh as possible.
To raise money, Calvert said she and others will go to the local Walmart and collect as much as $800 in one day. Calvert frequently praised and gave thanks for the Pea Ridge community's "generous donations" which help pay the real financial expenses of the pantry. She also gave frequent thanks to The Ridge Community Church, Walmart and Northwest Arkansas Food Bank, among others, which she said are vital contributors to the pantry.
She said yard sales are another way the pantry raises money, and one is being planned for later this summer.
The pantry also participates in Walmart's EVAP program. Calvert explained that Event Volunteerism Always Pays will give $3,000 to any non-profit that holds an event at which 20 Walmart employees work for five hours. Calvert said the pantry will do this with the yard sale, and there are other events the pantry holds that fit EVAP requirements. Calvert said, "We have to work smart."
And since the grant writing class, Calvert said she and Anthony meet every Tuesday at 6 p.m. to work on writing grants. Calvert said she spends, on average, 60 hours a week at the pantry itself and on work related to the pantry.
Cold, hard cash is needed, for sure, but donations from companies and stores also help supply the pantry's shelves and refrigerators.
Calvert said volunteers work in teams to pick up food donations at Walmart and Harps as well as from other businesses. They pick up fruit and vegetable donations every day, and she said they collected 102,000 pounds of produce in 2016. Calvert said if the pantry can't use it, she takes it to three other food pantries in the area and shares it with them.
Calvert said she, four steadfast crew members, and a total of 37 others, all volunteers, perform a variety of tasks throughout each week in preparation for the times the pantry is open. Most of the meat comes in containers, so volunteers repack it into one-gallon freezer bags. Canned, packaged and frozen foods have to be rotated, and purchased and donated items have to be sorted, catalogued and shelved. The Pack Shack provides packaged meals through its Feed the Funnel program, and other boxed meals are donated or purchased.
Each family or individual may visit the pantry twice a month. When they come, they fill out a simple form so that Calvert and the pantry have records and statistics that are needed to apply for grants. Calvert said the pantry serves people in Benton, Washington, Madison and Pulaski counties in Arkansas and people come from Missouri. She keeps meticulous records and can reel off facts and statistics quickly and confidently.
Calvert said she "fell into" becoming the pantry manager after she began volunteering in 2010. She said the people who were there when she came in slowly drifted away until she was the last person standing. Now, according to one volunteer, "Nobody quits out of the pantry, they die out."
Calvert has built a solid crew of four women who can handle things when she's not around, and together, they've worked out a system that keeps the pantry vibrant and grounded.
Then there are the "pantry kids," the volunteers' children and grandchildren. Volunteer Janet Rohrbough's grandson Drake Satterwhite made a small angel that rests at the base of a metal fish decoration in the lobby area.
Volunteer Jennifer Burkett had her two children, Peyton Burkett, 16, and Tristan, 10, with her one recent Tuesday. They helped hand out fruits and vegetables. Calvert said the youth help people carry bags to their cars, fetch items, remove empty bread flats and do all sorts of helpful tasks.
Rohrbough said volunteering "does the heart good." She said when she first began volunteering, she announced she didn't want any other responsibility, then she laughed and held out a wad of keys she has been entrusted with. She is the backup pantry manager when Calvert is away.
Calvert said the pantry was started in 2008 by The Ridge Community Church Pastor Bonnie Austin and church member Greg Cecil, and it served 12 families. When Calvert began volunteering in 2010, she said they felt wiped out after doing what was needed to provide food for those 12 families.
She said the pantry now serves 70-100 families a week, more than 800 people a month.
Loaves 'n Fishes Food Pantry is a registered 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, and all donations are tax deductible. It must comply with all federal regulations regarding safe food handling and storage and suffers fines when out of compliance. The pantry is open each week on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 9 to 11 a.m., and the first and third Wednesdays of each month from 4 to 6 p.m.
Loaves 'n Fishes Food Pantry provides food not only for regular needs and times but also all the fixings for a homemade Thanksgiving meal and gift items people can take home to wrap and put under the tree at Christmas time.
Calvert said, "I was a hungry kid in Michigan. One year we ate our horse. I want kids to wake up on Thanksgiving morning to the smell of a turkey roasting in the oven."
She said the pantry will give out 350 Thanksgiving meal bags. The bags will include, with some variation depending on what the pantry was able to purchase and what was donated, corn, sweet potatoes, green beans, instant mashed potatoes, gravy, cranberry sauce, stuffing mix, a 10- to 14-pound turkey, cake mix, frosting, pie crust mix, pie filling and fresh rolls.
At Christmas time, items the pantry has purchased throughout the year from United Way and received as donations will be available for families.
Editorial on 07/05/2017