MANSFIELD — It isn’t a city the place some households appear to fret about the place their subsequent meal will come from.
With tidy inexperienced frequent areas, a busy downtown, and median dwelling costs of simply over $700,000, Mansfield, a metropolis of 24,000, is an image of suburban prosperity.
However for some residents at the very least, that picture belies an issue of meals insecurity that has persevered by means of the pandemic and at a time of rising prices fueled by inflation.
“The variety of households has elevated post-Covid and the quantity of meals patrons take has elevated considerably,” says Chrissy Goldman, publicity coordinator for Our Day by day Bread, town’s volunteer meals pantry, which is popping 25. this 12 months.
“We hope that folks will proceed to decide on bigger quantities of meals,” he mentioned in an electronic mail to The Solar Chronicle.
- 365 households have registered within the pantry.
- Virtually 1,000 completely different individuals had been served in the course of the 12 months.
- Final 12 months virtually 30,000 baggage of meals had been distributed.
- There have been over 5,000 visits to the meals pantry.
- And most clients go to the pantry twice a month or extra.
Whereas some meals banks have confronted provide shortages of particular gadgets, Goldman mentioned that hasn’t been a problem at Mansfield to this point.
“We’ve supplemented any provide chain points with reward playing cards when particular meals weren’t obtainable,” he mentioned.
The pantry is subsequent to the Congregational Church on West Road and receives a number of help from the group. A latest Household Enjoyable Evening downtown drew a very good turnout for the pantry sales space, Goldman mentioned.
The pantry sources some gadgets from the Better Boston Meals Financial institution, which provides pantries within the space, in addition to donations from volunteers.
“We purchase among the financial donations,” Goldman mentioned in an interview, “and we make weekly journeys to the native supermarkets, notably issues which might be perishable, milk and meat, and so forth.”
The pantry moved to a drive-thru mannequin in the course of the pandemic, offering pre-packaged baggage of groceries for households whereas volunteers maintained social distancing.
Within the final two months, Our Day by day Bread is permitting households to have extra choices. “A volunteer helps you select and places the bag in your automobile. It is vitally a lot a shopping for expertise,” Goldman mentioned.
The pantry is open for normal walk-in distribution on Saturdays from 9 to 11 am The pantry additionally presents meals pickup on Thursdays, which requires ordering meals upfront.
