Prayer, Helping Hands put community food pantry in new home - Times Record News

Prayer, Helping Hands put community food pantry in new home - Times Record News

By Sarah Johnson

Posted: 3:00 a.m. 0

It's the mother who walks several blocks with a baby on her hip to receive a sack of groceries. The family with four little mouths to feed. The father and son in threadbare clothes who haven't eaten since yesterday. Hunger has many faces, and the Floral Heights Community Food Pantry has seen them all in the almost 40 years it's been helping feed people from a small kitchen at Floral Heights United Methodist Church.

What started as an emergency disaster relief effort after the 1979 tornado has grown into communitywide program that feeds more than 26,000 people each year. The food pantry took a giant step to secure its future when it moved from an outreach of the church to a full-fledged nonprofit in 2015.

Then it was time to find a new location.

"Honestly, we did a lot of praying," Ronna Prickett, chairman of the food pantry's board of directors and a member of Floral Heights, said. "The church began plans to renovate, so we needed to look for a new home. The food pantry was growing, so we needed more space. Becoming a nonprofit gave us opportunity to offer more services to the community."

Prickett wrote a grant request — her first — to Mueller Inc., a company in Texas that fabricates and sells metal buildings. Mueller had a program that awarded a building each year to a deserving nonprofit. Out of almost 300 applicants, Floral Heights Community Food Pantry won and next week will receive the eighth building donated by Mueller.

About 40 members of the company's Helping Hands volunteer group — comprised of Mueller store managers — will arrive in Wichita Falls Oct. 3 to erect the metal building at 903 Tyler in just three days. After the building goes up, the new home of Floral Heights Community Food Pantry will be dedicated at 11 a.m. Oct. 6, complete with a barbecue feast, bands and cheerleaders leading the celebration. The entire event will be televised by Bob Phillips of Texas Country Reporter.

Prickett knows that without this donation from Mueller, the outlook for the food pantry was pretty bleak.

"We had a deadline to vacate the church due to renovations and it would've been so expensive to buy and renovate an existing property," she said. "The church gave us the deed to the property on Tyler and that really helped get us going. Once Mueller was on board, other donations came flooding in. We were able to pour the foundation and lay the plumbing so the metal building could be put on top of it."

Prickett said once the donation of the metal building was official, she received an email saying "welcome to the Mueller family."

Mike Fry, marketing director for Mueller Inc., is excited to welcome Floral Heights Community Food Pantry into the family.

"When we started this program, we didn't expect all of the internal benefits to our company," Fry said. "We came away from that first build eight years ago with a newfound respect and camaraderie among our employees. We have not only tremendous work friendships now, but also true friendships.

Prickett, the board of directors of the food pantry and the entire congregation of Floral Heights are excited about the event, but more importantly, the number of people who will be helped in the food pantry's new space.

"We are the largest food pantry in a 12-county area," Prickett said. "You just don't realize how much need is out there."

Last year, with the help of its main partner, the Wichita Falls Area Food Bank, the Floral Heights Community Food Pantry served 26,531 clients, all of whom must meet an income guideline, which is listed in the Texas Emergency Food Assistance Program. The food pantry is open Monday, Tuesday and Thursday and is staffed by about 22 volunteers. They serve more than 215 families a week, which is about 860 people. Every month, the pantry averaged 785 children, 297 seniors, 22 veterans and 145 new clients, which totals 2,211 people.

"One of the neatest things is when some of our regulars don't need food, they come anyway and volunteer," Prickett said. "It just shows how grateful people are for the food they receive."

With its nonprofit status, the food pantry can go after more funding opportunities such as grants. With more room in the new building, it can offer more services like a resource section to dispense information on how to secure diapers and baby food as well as a coat closet in the winter.

"It's simple," Prickett said. "We are here on this earth to do God's work. God works through us. It is best said in Proverbs 14:31 — 'Whoever oppresses a poor man insults his Maker, but he who is generous to the needy honors him.' "

Prickett and her board are so excited about the new building, but the need for donations is ongoing. The fundraising goal is $589,000 to complete the interior, including heating and cooling. To donate, send your contribution to 2214 10th Street, Wichita Falls, TX 76309. For more information, call 867-3442.