The Citrus County Veterans Coalition’s mission is simple: Veterans helping veterans.
Part of that help includes groceries to enable vets or their widowed spouses make ends meet from month to month.
Currently, the coalition’s food pantry helps an average of 60 households, many with residents who live alone.
Since 2014, Susan Turner — herself the wife of a veteran and the mother of two Marine veterans — has run the food pantry, located at the Disabled American Veterans (DAV) building in Inverness.
With the help of about eight volunteers, the pantry is open every Tuesday and first and third Thursdays. Veterans can come and “shop” for food, including meat and eggs.
Most of the food comes from the Community Food Bank of Citrus County. The rest comes from generous community donors.
Often, when the veterans no longer need assistance, they become donors.
“It’s a way that a lot of our veterans in the county give back,” Turner said.
For three years, Turner has been the backbone of the pantry, ordering food and keeping records, as well as getting to know the veterans personally.
“We don’t just hand them a bag of food,” she said. “We bond with them, one on one. We sit down with them and ask, ‘How are you doing? What’s going on?’ That way, if they need other kinds of help, we can tell our coalition officers and they can make decisions about further help.”
Richard Floyd, the coalition chairman, said Turner has done a great job. That’s why when she announced that her macular degeneration has gotten to the point where she can no longer do her volunteer job, especially the record keeping, the coalition members were — and still are — saddened.
Floyd said if they don’t find someone who is willing to take her place, the pantry will close.
As he explained, the main problem is the same problem that’s common with many organizations that operate solely with volunteers: People who are able are often not willing.
“If we’re to continue, we need help — we need warm bodies,” he said.
Turner said the job she does is not difficult. It involves ordering food from the food bank, keeping track of inventory and keeping reports of the people who receive help.
“As a 501(c)(3), we’re required to keep records,” she said. “That’s something I can no longer do — the computer work that’s involved. It’s all done with Microsoft Word and Microsoft Excel.”
Running the food pantry costs the coalition about $600 a month. Their monthly yard sale on second Saturdays at Our Lady of Fatima Catholic Church in Inverness brings in between $800 and $1,200.
Floyd said the veterans coalition started in 2004 and, shortly after, they started the food pantry in someone’s house.
As a group, they do whatever they can to meet veterans’ needs — if they’re able and if they have funds.
In addition to a food pantry manager, they also need “muscle,” Floyd said. “Sometimes we get calls, somebody has furniture they want to donate, but most of us aren’t able to lift it...It’s a shame. I get calls all the time — this county is full of people who need help. But if we don’t get volunteers, if we don’t get the help, we’ll have to close our doors.”
To learn more about what the Citrus County Veterans Coalition does or learn more about how you can volunteer, call the coalition at 352-400-8952.
Contact Chronicle reporter Nancy Kennedy at 352-564-2927 or nkennedy@chronicleonline.com.
