The Fish & Loaves Community Food Pantry is celebrating 10 years of helping area residents.
Fish & Loaves Community Food Pantry is a 501(c)(3) food pantry in Taylor, Michigan, dedicated to “Ensuring No One Goes Hungry” in seven communities: Allen Park, Brownstown Township, Dearborn Heights, Romulus, Southgate, Taylor and Woodhaven.
Fish & Loaves is a faith-based, non-sectarian organization staffed by volunteers and offering a wide range of canned goods, refrigerated and frozen foods, dairy products and seasonal produce. Since opening its doors in 2008, Fish & Loaves has assisted tens of thousands of local residents, providing 1.6 million pounds of food last year alone.
The need for emergency food, emergency housing and youth programs emerged from a 1992 forum on Taylor’s needs in 1992. The forum, organized by Rev. Dr. Geoffrey Drutchas, the senior pastor of St. Paul United Church of God in Taylor, and the Rev. Hal Weemhoff, then pastor of West Mound United Church in Taylor, drew 22 participants, most of who had never met before that day.
Further discussion and investigation by forum members led to the formation of Christnet, an emergency shelter program for the homeless in the Downriver area. Rev. Drutchas served as volunteer president and executive director of Christnet for the first 10 years before the directorship transitioned to paid leadership.
Several years later, based on a need for emergency food in the region, Rev. Drutchas renewed efforts with former meat market owner Chuck Vella, Joan Forest of St. Cyril of Jerusalem Catholic Church (now Our Lady of the Angels), Associate Pastor Amos Humphries of Gilead Baptist Church and others.
The group brought together additional volunteers and financial sources and provided an initial food distribution during the Christmas holidays at the Taylor Sportsplex. The success of that distribution led to further meetings, a search for a permanent pantry for a food pantry, a partnership with Gleaners, Forgotten Harvest and other organizations and the creation of Fish & Loaves.
“Fish and Loaves has always been about community partnerships that are concerned about helping those in need,” Rev. Drutchas said. Focus Hope partnered on a food program for seniors. Wayne County supplied food commodities. More recently, Wayne-Metro Community Action Agency has partnered with Fish & Loaves.
The goal of partnering with churches in the region came to fruition through a 50/50 program, where 50 churches agreed to contribute $50 a month to assist with the operation of the pantry.
The pastor wrote for a variety of grants and received assistance in the early days from United Way and low-cost food from the USDA.
Fish & Loaves is a client-choice pantry, which means clients choose the food they need in a store-like setting.
The first year of operation, Fish & Loaves volunteers distributed a half-million pounds of food. A few years later, a “Million Pound March” was held outside the pantry to commemorate a million-pound annual food distribution. In 2017, $1.6 million pounds of food were distributed.
To meet the needs, the board organized several annual fundraising events, including the Santa’s Magic Forest holiday display in Taylor, an 18-hole golf outing, a 5K run and a concert. Successful non-perishable food drives to help stock pantry shelves are conducted by youth groups, schools, mail carriers, local businesses and others.
A key to Fish & Loaves’ goal of meeting the food needs of its local communities has been the participation of volunteers. Chuck Vella, Russ Newsome, Bev Sitz, Howard Wilson, Connie Fedel, Dave Kulhanek and others provided expertise needed in the warehouse and office.
With steady growth – in both the need for food and the cost of food – the Board of Directors hired its first paid employee: an executive director. In 2017, a part-time warehouse manager was hired.
Current Executive Director Mary Hollens has brought force expertise needed to attract larger corporate donations, including assistance from such organizations as the Ford Motor Fund and Masco. The City of Taylor, the Colina Foundation and others
“As time has gone on and the economy improved, people think the problem is over – but it has not,” Rev. Drutchas said. “It’s just more hidden. In fact, what happened is we saw the cost of food edge up higher and higher. We’re paying double of what we paid when we started out. Initially, we thought we would have people cycle out after a couple years and we could limit it. That was not feasible.
“Fish & Loaves is one of the few client-choice pantries that have survived. The City of Taylor is such a special community and Downriver is such a special area, which gives rise to Fish & Loaves to work effectively.”
The pantry is located at 25670 Northline Road. For more information, call (734) 992-6284 or visit the website www.flcfp.org.
