News Release
Even while preparing to open a new, larger pantry early next year, St. Vincent de Paul’s temporary Madison pantry is helping feed an average of 90 families per day.
With numbers of client families at or near record highs recently, volunteers and staff members at Dane County’s busiest food pantry say they are glad their temporary facility will be replaced by a new, larger and better-equipped pantry within a few months. The food pantry, which serves all Dane County ZIP Codes five days each week, is operated by the local Society of St. Vincent de Paul.
"We have served as many as 123 families in a single four-hour shift," said Ralph Middlecamp, executive director of Madison’s district council of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul.
"We think of our pantry as a leading economic indicator of local need," Middlecamp said. "And lately that need has been high. Our pantry helped more than 1,900 families just in September. That’s our highest monthly figure ever and an average of about 90 families per day.
"We gave away almost 40 percent more food in the last 12 months than we did annually just two years ago, after our first full year in this location."
Sited just east of Fish Hatchery Road at 1309 Culmen St. in the town of Madison, the pantry occupies a converted auto-radiator repair shop that for the past three years has been the St. Vincent de Paul Food Pantry & Service Center. It is now dwarfed by the two-story facility taking shape next to it.
Middlecamp said the roughly 4,000 square feet of pantry and storage space in the interim building will be replaced by about 12,000 square feet in the new center on the adjacent lot, 2033 Fish Hatchery Road. He said the new center is slated to open in January, when the old building will be torn down to make way for warehouse and dock space that will help maximize the new pantry’s efficiency. The entire structure should be completed in March, he said.
"As we do now, we will run the new pantry according to a customer-choice model. That means we operate the facility like a small grocery store in which our volunteers help clients pick appropriate foods that their families prefer and will actually eat," Middlecamp said. He noted that customer choice helps honor the dignity and ethnic preferences of pantry clients, while it also helps minimize waste.
Middlecamp said that during the fiscal year that ended in September, the St. Vincent de Paul pantry gave away food valued at more than $1,186,000 – a record. With food prices rising significantly in recent months, buying more food to allow the pantry to meet rising need will be a challenge, he said.
"When we surveyed our food pantry clients this summer, we found that almost one-third had either never used our pantry before or hadn’t needed to in more than a year," Middlecamp said. "We see an increase in new clients as yet another sign that local need is on the rise."
Middlecamp said that there are three main ways members of the public can help the pantry meet local needs. One is to donate non-perishable food and any remaining fresh garden produce directly to the pantry. Another is to join the group of volunteers who work two- or four-hour scheduled shifts – often weekly – to help run the pantry. And the other way to help is by making a tax-deductible donation of funds, especially toward the capital campaign to build the new St. Vincent de Paul Food Pantry & Service Center.
During the last two and a half years, Middlecamp said, St. Vincent de Paul has raised more than $3.1 million in cash and pledges locally toward the Society’s $4 million goal for the Help Build Hope Campaign to build the new center. Middlecamp said the effort is the first capital campaign St. Vincent de Paul has conducted in the Society’s 83 years of serving people struggling with poverty in the Madison area.
"We are hopeful we can open our new pantry early next year free of debt on the much-needed building it will occupy," Middlecamp said. "That will enable us to devote our full resources to providing food and service to meet what will likely continue to be increased need – rather than having to divert funds toward paying down a mortgage."
Middlecamp invited those able to help with food, time or funds to call (608) 442-9878 to offer their contribution or to get more information.