Tigard church feeds city’s hungry

Tigard Covenant Church’s food pantry is a big success, feeding the area’s hungry with donations from local grocers

By Geoff Pursinger

The Times, Nov 12, 2009

For Barb Woolverton, feeding the hungry wasn’t an option, but a decree from God.

“We had been approached by the Oregon Food Bank about opening up a food pantry in our church, but we had said no,” she said. “Then, I ended up in the hospital and then I heard a voice say ‘you will do this’ and I knew that it was God’s will.”

It was then that Woolverton, an associate pastor at Tigard Covenant Church near Beef Bend Road in Tigard, cleaned out a closet, stocked it with food, and became an official agent of the Oregon Food Bank, handing out food to anyone in the Tigard-Tualatin area who needs it.

“These people come in so humbled,” she said, surveying a line of about four families, waiting for their weekly allotment of groceries. “But when they leave they are just so relieved, it’s such a weight off of them.”

Woolverton and the rest of her crew of volunteers have been feeding the hungry since April, giving every family who walks through their doors enough food to provide three square meals a day, for an entire week.

The food comes from a variety of places, including Grocery Outlet, Safeway, Haggen Food & Pharmacy, and Fred Meyer, as well as the Oregon Food Bank.

“We also get a lot of people who come in and donate food,” Woolverton said. “People just come in and say ‘hey, can you use this?’”

The food pantry recently received leftover Halloween candy from a local resident, which they hope to distribute to some of the kids.

“The most important thing for us is to give people nutritious meals,” she said. “But it’s also nice to have a treat every once in a while.”

Every family receives fruit, vegetables, bread, meat — including pork, turkey, and ham — pasta, canned meals, eggs, rice, cereal, dairy products, vegetable oil, and juice as well as other items that the pantry may have on hand, including margarine, coffee and soda.

The average family will take home approximately 50 pounds of food each week, Woolverton said.

It all stems from David Greenidge, the church’s pastor for the past five years.

Greenidge can remember what it was like to grow up hungry.

“It didn’t happen a lot, but I can remember some days for lunch eating a mayonnaise sandwich,” he said. “I’ve never forgotten what it’s like to be hungry.”

It was because of his past experience with hunger, and Oregon’s crippling hunger problem — 12.4 percent of Oregon’s population struggled with hunger between 2005 and 2007, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s most recent figures — that Greenidge started community dinners at the church, where the area’s homeless or hungry could receive a hot meal once a month.

The success of the meals led the Oregon Food Bank to contact the church about setting up a food bank.

Initially hesitant about starting it, Woolverton is now committed to keeping it going for as long as necessary.

“As long as the need is here, and as long as the Lord provides, we’ll be here,” she said. “There are some weeks where we’re afraid we won’t have enough food to open that day, and then, all of a sudden, here comes all this food.”

The food pantry relies on the donations of food or money from local members of the community, because the church has no budget in place for the food pantry.

“We set up the church’s budget in January, but we didn’t know that the food pantry would happen until April,” said Becky Long, who volunteers her time with the pantry. “So we don’t have any money set aside for us.”

Despite the fact that the budget was already in place, they decided to go ahead with the pantry anyway and to pay for any expenses out of pocket.

Food that isn’t donated is bought from the Oregon Food Bank. But even with the organization’s discounted rates, Long said, the food pantry’s monthly expenses are around $500 to $600.

All in all, Long said, the pantry is a learning experience.

“We are applying for grants,” she said. “But we aren’t grant writers; we don’t know how to do all this stuff. We just kinda pay as we go and hope that the money comes in.”

The pantry usually serves around 20 families a day, and news of the pantry has spread by word of mouth.

“We don’t have the budget to advertise,” Greenidge said. “But still, probably 20 percent of all phone calls I get during the day are related to our food pantry.”

Greenidge said that the congregation has been more than supportive and helpful in making sure that the pantry is a success.

“It’s been a real neat experience,” he said. “I tell people all the time how much I really enjoy this church. The people are so very friendly and willing to get out and do community events. They have a real love for people, and when they show it like this I know that we are really doing the will of God.”

The food panty is open public Tuesdays and Thursdays from 9 a.m. to noon. The church is located at 11321 S.W. Naeve St.