Antioch senior pantry provides food, nutrition for elderly - Times Record

Antioch senior pantry provides food, nutrition for elderly - Times Record

By Thomas Saccente Times Recordtsaccente@swtimes.com

With its mission of delivering food to the elderly, the Antioch Senior Mobile Pantry plays a critical role in the lives of many area residents. 

The Senior Mobile Pantry was founded about six years ago as one of the many facets of Antioch Consolidated Association for Youth and Family. Charolette Tidwell, the Antioch Executive Director, said it was created to provide seniors in the Fort Smith area with the food they need to live on their own. 

"The independent living is a focus we've made as a strategy to be able to keep these persons independent, cooking their own food, their normal activities of daily living, they can continue," Tidwell said. "That is important from the aspect of keeping them healthier, more satisfied mentally when they're able to fix their own food." 

One of the inspirations for the mobile pantry came from Tidwell witnessing an elderly woman at a grocery store buying cat food. During this, she noticed the cashier taking the elderly woman's name and phone number, and afterward asked the cashier why she did that. 

"She said they were recording the elderly's name and phone number because they knew that they were buying this as a source of their protein," Tidwell said. "That's actually what prompted us starting the Senior Mobile Pantry. I couldn't stand the thought of that. I could not believe that, my mother or my grandmother eating that."

Tidwell also pointed to the difficulties seniors face in securing transportation as another reason for the pantry's creation. 

The packages of food the elderly receive through the Senior Mobile Pantry weigh between 55 to 60 pounds, Tidwell said. They are designed to provide those who receive them with sustenance taken from the five basic food groups.

"Seniors particularly do not like frozen, prepackaged food," Tidwell said. "We've heard a tremendous amount of comments from them, seen it ... where the frozen food that comes in to them is just kind of stacked real high in the freezer. They claim they're going to eat it, but they really do like the fresh vegetables, the fresh fruit, the fresh meat that they can prepare in their own style." 

Tidwell noted the difficulty in securing items such as fresh milk and eggs for the pantry, although Antioch can purchase them periodically from the River Valley Regional Food Bank. 

"We're on a mission to try to see about putting more of the egg and milk product in the (packages)," Tidwell said. "We always get it when it's available. ..."

Community impact 

The Antioch Senior Mobile Pantry serves nine apartment complexes and other locations in the Fort Smith area, Tidwell said. The managements of these complexes are notified when the pantry is scheduled to make deliveries to them, allowing the elderly who wish to partake in it the opportunity to plan their week ahead of time. The elderly are then able to pick up their food packages when the pantry arrives on the scheduled day. They can receive one package per month this way, although seniors can also pick up their packages at the Antioch food pantry at 1122 N. 11th St.

Certain staff members of some of the places where the pantry delivers have voiced their appreciation for it. Kerri Norman, the property manager of Midtown Apartments, said Antioch's contributions to the low-income seniors it serves there have allowed them to make ends meet on a monthly basis. 

"(On a limited income), you don't have enough for groceries at the end of the month," Norman said. "You might have medications that you need to purchase instead of groceries. What they provide is a nice variety, so they can make several meals out of what Antioch delivers and provides for our tenants." 

Jason Schibbelhut, assistant manager of Gorman Towers, was of a similar opinion. He said since Senior Mobile Pantry first started delivering to Gorman Towers, many of the seniors who live there have come to depend on the food the pantry provides. 

"When (the pantry) actually (does) come, we'll set up our commons area, and it pretty much packs it in back here," Schibbelhut said. "(The seniors will) ask us about it even before we know what day that they're coming. Some of them come back for updates asking when they come. It's almost become a staple of their income in a way for several of them. When some of them are only making $733 a month or so and about 200 of that's going out for rent and such, they've pretty much come to depend on some of it as part of their well-being. ..." 

Tidwell said assisting seniors through this mobile pantry is important due to the increased nutrition it provides them. 

"If we look at what our medical cost is in America, we know, in fact, ... healthy nutrition is important to keep the immune system good," Tidwell said. "It's important that so many of these elderly are taking just lots and lots of medications, and so the healthier we can keep them as far as nutrition is concerned, it will not only decrease our healthcare costs, but it will also increase the quality of life that they have because they're not being hospitalized because of poor nutrition, which I saw in the 45 years that I was in health care ... ."