The Delaware Valley Food Pantry celebrated its grand re-opening on Sept. 21 at its new location in the CVS Shopping Center at 65-11 Cherry Street in Lambertville.
Director of Operations for Delaware Valley Food Pantry Joe McGrath said that the new space is approximately 50% larger than the organization’s previous space within St. John the Evangelist Roman Catholic Church, located on 44 Bridge Street.
According to McGrath, the relocation has increased public awareness of the organization -- first established in 1955 to help victims of Hurricane Hazel -- and resulted in an uptick in the number of individuals volunteering for and collecting food from the pantry.
"We’re getting a lot of donations of food from people who we never saw before, and they never saw us before, because we were sort of hidden (at the church). But now they’re coming in, they’re donating food, they’re volunteering. We must have had 20 people who have volunteered in the last month or so that want to help us with the work here. So that’s very encouraging,” McGrath said.
Visitors can park their cars in a parking lot attached to the organization, which the church lacked and which McGrath said has dually contributed to the influx in foot traffic at the pantry.
“That was always a problem -- trying to find a spot in Lambertville to get adequate parking. But this is a large parking lot, and our customers -- those that don’t walk -- do use that parking area,” McGrath said.
Delaware Valley Food Pantry feeds between 1,000 and 1,200 individuals per month, who visit the store and collect food from the shelves like they would at any local supermarket.
“They don’t just get a bag of food; they get to choose what they want," McGrath explained. "And we make sure they don’t take too many of one thing, so everybody gets a chance, especially for the things that are in demand.”
These individuals -- who are predominantly from Lambertville but also venture to the pantry from contiguous communities like West Amwell Township and Frenchtown -- are qualified to collect food from the organization if they either are already enrolled in a federal or state aid program, or if their incomes either meet or are below the Federal Poverty Guidelines.
“The broadest purpose is to help the needy in our communities, and most specifically to provide food for those who are in need of food in the community," McGrath said. "And, in these kinds of wealthy communities, there’s a lot of surprise that we have people that are food insecure and need help to get food on the table, but there are quite a few of them.”
While roughly 30% of the food collected by the pantry is donated, the other 70% is provided by Norwescap, a Phillipsburg-based organization that gathers and sells food to the organization on a bimonthly basis.
“(Norwescap) sends me an inventory list of what food they have. And I pick out how much of each item we would like to have delivered to us," McGrath explained.
The food distributed by Norwescap is charged at 19 cents per pound, which Delaware Valley Food Pantry raises through monetary donations from community members and local churches.
“Fortunately we have some people who just write us a check without any solicitation. They just send it to us; it’s terrific," McGrath said.
Now that the organization is paying rent and utility costs, McGrath said he is hoping to increase the number of cash donations the pantry receives.
Additionally, in an effort to support individuals without cars who live in either New Hope or the Southern part of Lambertville, McGrath said that organization is trying to arrange for the Hunterdon County LINK Transportation system to transport individuals to the pantry.
“There’s people who used to walk from New Hope to where we were before, and now we’re much farther away. So we haven’t solved that problem yet. Some people are coming and some people are not coming,” McGrath said.
Despite the few outstanding issues that the pantry faces, McGrath -- who has been involved in the organization for 20 years -- said that his commitment to helping the community has never faltered.
“It’s very rewarding. I worked in the industry for a long time, and I felt that -- while I was doing alright -- I wasn’t really contributing a lot to society or helping my neighbor very much. So I’ve had the chance to do that, and I really like doing it. We help people every day that we’re open, and it’s very gratifying," McGrath said.
Delaware Valley Food Pantry is open on Wednesdays from 2 to 4 p.m. and Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m.
Individuals interested in donating to the organization can make out checks to Delaware Valley Food Pantry and send them to P.O. Box 705, Lambertville, N.J. 08530.
Caroline Fassett can be reached at cfassett@njadvancemedia.com.
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