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Hunger continues to devastate Johnson County.
More people than ever are searching out assistance simply to feed their families and themselves. Long lines are commonplace at local food pantries. Free community meals are regularly filled.
Now, two major contributors in the fight against food insecurity are teaming up to better address the problem.
The Salvation Army of Johnson County is joining with the Interchurch Food Pantry to more effectively feed county residents. With the food pantry regularly helping feed more than 100 families each day, the partnership allows the Salvation Army to contribute money along with the network of churches already supporting it, rather than operate their own pantry.
Doing so is a better use of funding for both food insecurity efforts and the Salvation Army’s other outreach programs.
“It’s an opportunity to be more intentional with the resources we have. The community of Johnson County has been unbelievably generous to us, through our Red Kettle season, through annual donations. Lots of those resources are being used so we can maintain a program that, at least in our location, has no real long-term impact,”said Captain Vinal Lee, director of the Salvation Army of Johnson County. “Now, the impact of that service is going to be much greater.”
The partnership allows each organization to focus on what they do best, said Carol Phipps, executive director of the Interchurch Food Pantry.
“For us, that meant directly providing food to Salvation Army clients and for the Salvation Army, it meant focusing on their immediate needs assistance and other programs serving the community. These enables both organizations to fulfill their missions to best serve the community,” she said.
Nationally, the Salvation Army annually helps more than 23 million people in the United States overcome poverty, addiction and economic hardships through a range of social services: providing food for the hungry, emergency relief for disaster survivors, rehabilitation for those suffering from drug and alcohol abuse, and clothing and shelter for people in need. The organization operates 7,600 centers around the country, including the one in Greenwood.
For years, the group has had its own food pantry. But leaders had started wondering if they could assist people more effectively.
“We continue to see a decline in our food pantry’s numbers, while Interchurch (Food Pantry) continues to see an increase. So it didn’t make sense for us to continue dividing community resources so that we, in our food pantry, could do a minimal amount of work, while Interchurch works off divided resources,” Lee said.
Through the partnership, the Salvation Army will provide funds to the Interchurch Food Pantry to support its ongoing mission. At the same time, the space that formerly housed its food pantry in its Greenwood center will continue to be used for Salvation Army programs already in place, while allowing for expansion of other much-needed services.
The organization will cease operations of its existing food pantry in Greenwood on May 9.
“That frees up our volunteers and resources to better focus on programs with other immediate needs,” Lee said.
A central part of that renewed focus is No Place to Call Home, an initiative of United Way of Johnson County. The program helps individuals facing homelessness find self-sufficiency through coordinated case management.
The Salvation Army’s Pathway of Hope ministry will also play a larger role in the new plan. This national program helps families end the cycle of generational poverty through long-term intensive case management, helping people create individualized plans and coaching parents through the completion of their goals and beyond.
“These are all intensive case management programs that intend to target the root causes of poverty, homelessness and generational poverty,” Lee said.
The partnership helps boost the Interchurch Food Pantry at a time when the need for food is greatest. The pantry opens every day from Monday through Friday, and two Saturdays each month. In addition, volunteers are collecting and distributing food, as well as delivering to homebound households.
In 2021, the pantry served the equivalent of 1 million meals to clients.
Our pantry is well set up to provide a broad array of nutritious food,” Phipps said.
The Interchurch Food Pantry provides referrals and connects households coming for food with other community resources, and will now be able to do that with the Salvation Army’s programs and services, Phipps said.
Officials and volunteers for both organizations are excited to be able to work together.
“We look forward to partnering with the Salvation Army and appreciate their confidence in our ability to fight hunger,” Phipps said.
