PARKS FILL UP
Connecticut’s food pantries face overwhelming demand as more residents become unemployed during pandemic
About a dozen state parks close Saturday afternoon to avoid overcrowding.
From Stamford to Bridgeport to East Hartford, food pantries and food banks say they are facing a surge in demand as Connecticut residents confronting sudden unemployment are forced to seek help during the coronavirus pandemic.
Foodshare, which serves Hartford and Tolland counties, and the Connecticut Food Bank, which serves more than 600 pantries and programs in six counties, say demand is up by as much as 30%. At the Food Bank of Lower Fairfield County, demand is up by 50%.
And in local pantries, organizers say they have seen demand double since the coronavirus pandemic began and unemployment spiked.
“The incredibly rapid job loss just created a skyrocketing demand,” said Paul Shipman, a spokesman for the Connecticut Food Bank, where they have also had to make their own large food purchases because donations from supermarkets have not been available.
“We are really pushing as hard as we can to maintain a supply and keep our network supplied, so we’ve been aggressively buying food,” Shipman said. “In the last month or so we have purchased about 2.1 million pounds of food. That’s more than we purchased in all of last year.”
In the Hartford area, there’s a long line of cars each day at Rentschler Field in East Hartford, where Foodshare has been distributing 20 pounds of food to each individual each day. The numbers are growing by the day.
The food bank began distributing food at Rentschler Field on April 20 and averaged about 1,000 cars a day the first four days, said Foodshare CEO Jason Jakubowski.
The number seeking help hit 1,200 on Friday and Monday, then shot up to 1,549 on Tuesday and has averaged about 1,500 cars a day since.
The organization gave away 120,000 pounds of food this week and will continue to do so next week, Jakubowski said.
“The need is definitely great and … has increased astronomically,” Jakubowski said. “Most of the people we are seeing at Rentschler … are brand new to the issue of food insecurity. These are people who, until four weeks ago, were gainfully employed and who, through no fault of their own, have suddenly found themselves unemployed or struggling to find out where their next meal is coming from.”
To meet the increasing need, Foodshare has been forced to buy food. It spent $300,000 for food in all of 2019, but has spent $325,000 so far this year, he said. The organization normally counts on donations from grocers, food distributors and others.
And while demand is up, so are contributions. “We have seen individuals step up, we have seen corpo
rations step up, we have seen foundations step up,” he said. “Our monetary donations are at a record high.”
The Rentschler distribution thus far has been funded with $500,000 donations from Dalio Philanthropies and 4-CT, the Connecticut COVID-19 Charity Connection. Foodshare is working to extend the Rentschler distribution beyond May 8.
On the front lines, at local food pantries, conditions are mixed. In Greater Hartford, several pantry operators said they are holding their own.
They have seen increased demand but also increased support from Foodshare, from volunteers and the wider community.
Allison Hild of Loaves and Fishes Ministries, which operates a food pantry and soup kitchen at Immanuel Congregational Church on Farmington Avenue in Hartford, said the need has increased.
Because of the pandemic, the organization has been forced to shut down its soup kitchen, but continues to provide groceries to 75 to 80 people on Mondays.
“We’re definitely starting to see more new faces,” she said. “I hope more people are learning we’re doing this on Mondays. We do have the food right now.”
Volunteers and other donors have stepped up to help cover the increased need, she said. “I’ve been a little overwhelmed by the response,” Hild said. Volunteers are bringing baked items for families and buying canned goods to add to the distribution.
“People are really trying to find ways to help us make the bags full,” she said.
Financial contributions have also increased, as people and corporate donors see the increased need, she said.
“We just want to give food to people — people we know from the soup kitchen, people we’ve never seen before, it doesn’t matter,” Hild said.
Demand is up about 50% at food pantries and even more dramatically at soup kitchens in East Hartford, said Jo-Ann Dorn, who works in the town’s social services office. And supply has matched the increase in demand, she said.
“I’m amazed every day — there’s new resources,” Dorn said. Foodshare is a big supplier, along with several grocery stores in East Hartford, she said.
“So far we haven’t had an issue with supply,” she said. “All our food banks are fully stocked. Our volunteers are absolutely fabulous.”
In Bridgeport and Stamford, food pantry volunteers say they have been hit hard by the pandemic.
The Bishop Jean Williams Food Pantry in Bridgeport, which is part of the Park City
Initiative, was serving about 300 families a week, but the caseload has doubled, said the Rev. Mary Green, director of the pantry and pastor at the Amazing Grace Church. “We’re now serving about 600 families a week and we get new calls every day,” she said.
The supply is down, both from local grocers and the Connecticut Food Bank, she said.
“We are stretching it,” she said. “The demand is great. We don’t turn people away. We give what we have.” The pantry distributes food three days a week.
At the Wilson Memorial Church of God in Christ pantry in Stamford, pantry director Joyce Gumbus said her shelves are empty.
“We don’t get a lot of food right now and we do need a lot of food.”
The pantry normally serves 150 to 200 families a week, but, because at least one Stamford pantry has shut down, Wilson Memorial is trying to feed 300 families, Gumbus said.
“We are not a large pantry,” she said. “Sometimes we run out of money and we throw in money ourselves. We are all volunteers.”
Gumbus is also regularly on the phone with Kate Lombardo at the Food Bank of Lower Fairfield County in Stamford. “Sometimes when I don’t have enough food I start crying and I call her,” she said. And Lombardo does her best to come through, she said.
Lombardo said she’s doing whatever she can to get food to provide to pantries. “We just keep ordering,” she said. And the food bank distributes what it has.
“We’re trying to meet [demand] as best we can,” Lombardo said. “I’m not cutting off any agency during this time.”
David Owens can be reached at dowens@courant.com.