The town of Glenrock was without a food pantry for a couple of months, but before the previous one closed, a group of volunteers took it upon themselves to ensure the gap would only be temporary. With the help of the town, the Glenrock Area Food Pantry is now fully operational.
We chatted with Melissa Hershley, president of the all-volunteer board, about the effort.
How did this get started? Kristy Grant, Holly Block and Sharon Kemp saw the need in the community for this. They knew the other (food pantry) was closing and started looking into what it would take to start a new one. Kristy and Sharon asked me to sit on the board and I was voted as president. It’s literally all grassroots, volunteer help.
Where do you get your food? We purchase our canned goods and dry goods from
Wyoming Food Bank of the Rockies. We go every other Monday. They also have a program called grocery rescue, they go in and pick out produce that grocery stores have donated that’s at the end of its life and we go get that and bring it back here to Glenrock also.
How did you find your space? Sharon and Kristy went to the town and they agreed to give us the space for one year rent-free. That is huge support from the town.
Early on, your numbers have been impressive. We’ve had two distributions, the third one is this Wednesday. On Sept. 11, the day we opened, we had 61 families sign in and those families included 53 adults, 51 seniors and 85 children. We distributed 1,779.95 pounds of food in five hours. That was crazy to us that there was that much need. Two weeks later, on Sept. 25, we served 76 families, 76 adults, 47 seniors and 125 children with 2,468.91 pounds of food.
And you don’t require proof of need to get help? There is no financial stipulation to it, no income guidelines. We don’t care if you have a job, if you need groceries, you need groceries. None of that matters to us. We just want to make sure the community is being served.
Can you use more volunteer help? We are not going to turn away anyone. If you want to volunteer, we will put you on our list. Over 40 people have expressed an interest. We have to go to Casper to pick up things, stock the shelves, help the people, clean up after distributions. There are many ways to help.
Could you use some canned food drives? We are actually looking at doing a food drive with the school district right now. If your group or your church wants to do a food drive, we’d love to accept that. If people want to volunteer or do a food drive, they can call me at 277-7151.
Tell us about your distributions. The second and fourth Wednesday of every month (Oct. 9 and 23) at 506 West Birch, Ste. 15 (right downtown). Seniors and the disabled can come from 1 to 3 p.m. General public can come from 4 to 7 p.m. We set the seniors’ hours like that because the senior center bus stops running at 2:30 p.m. and that way they can take the bus down here and get back in time.
And there is a ribbon cutting? Yes we are having a ribbon cutting open house this Monday, Oct. 7, at 6 p.m. and everyone is welcome. We can’t thank our volunteers, this great community and the town of Glenrock enough for everybody’s support.
