St. Vincent de Paul pantry in Portage expands offerings to produce and dairy - Portage Daily Register

St. Vincent de Paul pantry in Portage expands offerings to produce and dairy - Portage Daily Register

The St. Vincent de Paul Food Pantry in Portage has been a resource for people going through hard times for the past seven years, but for the first time is now offering milk, eggs, yogurt and produce along with the more typical canned goods available at pantries.

Corn on the cob has been plentiful but that's starting to come to an end this year.

“We were getting eight banana boxes of corn,” said Tricia Pionke, general manager of St. Vincent de Paul in Portage. “And we never know what we’re getting when we are picking up from any location.”

After a handful of notable donations, the St. Vincent de Paul store, on the west edge of town where West Wisconsin Street becomes Highway 16, has needed to do some reorganizing. Part of the expansion was possible through a $1,000 donation from Aprilaire of Poynette. The store also received an anonymous donation of a commercial cooler.

“Before we did the fresh produce and dairy, if somebody was really in need, we also had vouchers they could take for milk, bread and eggs and could take those vouchers to Pierce’s and Pierce’s would just bill us,” said Pionke.

Pierce's Market has been one of the supporters of the organization, with produce deliveries also coming from Wal-Mart and Kwik Trip.

The pantry has served about 200 homes each month, but with the help of word of mouth, there has been a recent increase in both clients and volunteers, with Pionke hearing from people offering to bring meals and groceries to elderly, home-bound residents.

Food bank managers have an ongoing challenge to develop an efficient, cost-effective way to get food to those who need it, logistical challenges and limitations that can be unique to their clients.

One benefit of St. Vincent de Paul’s new cooler is that they are able to store pre-packed meals.

“Sometimes we get people who are homeless who have been gifted a stay at the Ridge, but don’t have a refrigerator, they don’t have a sink, they don’t have a stove,” said Pionke.

An ongoing challenge for food pantries is having enough volunteers to run the operation, Pionke says. St. Vincent de Paul, though, has been fortunate and able to maintain full-time hours, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Saturday, with extended hours of 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Fridays.

St. Vincent de Paul is looking toward more change, according to Pionke, with options that have included looking at new facilities and bringing in architects and engineers to see what might be possible through renovation of the current facility, which is a good location for the enterprise, she said.

As a part of the larger Society of St. Vincent de Paul, the organization has outside support and the Portage operation is considering broadening its services.

In Sauk Prairie, the group has hired a full-time nurse for administering medication to combat opioid addiction.

“There is the dental clinic in Mauston, if we wanted to go in that route we could. If we wanted to do a soup kitchen, we could do that,” said Pionke. “The sky’s the limit on what we can do. But it depends on what funds we have and how people frequent us.”