Roving Food Drive a Hit at Church

April 27, 2007

Burlington Free Press
Mallets Bay- Mary Lou DeCosta said she tries to get food to people who need it in as painless a manner as possible -- which is why she found herself standing on the front stoop of the Malletts Bay Congregational Church on Thursday, presiding over a pile of boxes filled with potatoes, Cornish game hens, cottage cheese, 98 percent fat-free ice cream, snack crackers, fruit juice and other staples.

A crowd pawed through the boxes, collecting food and carrying it to their cars.

DeCosta tried to help, ripping away plastic, directing people toward the hens and pushing the potatoes. "This is so fun. I love doing this. I really do."

This was known as a Neighborhood Food Pantry. The Vermont Food Bank does about a hundred of these a year. A Food Bank truck stops at an organization, drops off 5,000 to 6,000 pounds of food and lets needy people just take it away.

Organizations pay a $250 fee for the giveaway; businesses and people often chip in. In this case, Northfield Savings Bank contributed, as did DeCosta's co-workers at the Chittenden Regional Correctional Facility.

The Vermont Food Bank truck hissed to a stop in the driveway at the white clapboard church at 1 p.m. sharp, the appointed hour. The giveaway was scheduled to start at 2 p.m., but already a dozen people were milling about waiting to collect the food.

Jim Pace, 50, a burly truck driver and supervisor for the Food Shelf, unloaded pallets of food from the truck and stood back as people went to town on the packages. "It makes you feel good when people appreciate it," he said.

There's no science to deciding which food to bring to a Neighborhood Food Pantry, Pace said. They try for variety, but also try to clear the Food Shelf warehouse of any excessive amounts of a particular type of food. That's why there were a lot of potatoes at Malletts Bay Congregational Church on Thursday.

Church trustee Don Ballas said he always gets hooked into these charity events, but said he doesn't mind. "I think the pleasure is in looking at people's faces, their surprise at what's here," he said.

DeCosta said most of the 6,000 pounds of food would go by late afternoon, and anything remaining would go to the Chittenden Emergency Food Shelf. Then, she said, she would turn her attention to running the summer lunch program at the church, which last year fed 66 children, she said.
Contact Matt Sutkoski at 660-1846 or msutkosk@bfp.burlingtonfreepress.com

April 27, 2007

Press Room