‘It’s harder this year’

Organizations try to provide food to needy

Volunteer Lisa Morris prepares distribution bags. Del Norte Triplicate/Bryant Anderson

“It’s just harder this year,” Debra Brixey said as she filled out an application for a Christmas food basket from Rural Human Services on Friday.

Ever since she lost her job as a professional caretaker last year, she occasionally comes to the RHS food bank, which supplies about three meals a month to qualifying clients.

“These are people that have been successful long-time workers and all of the sudden they get laid off and they have a family,” RHS special projects coordinator Ron Phillips said of many of the food bank’s clients. 

Another woman filling out an application for holiday food on Friday got laid off in the summer of 2010. She’s a certified nursing assistant with two kids still at home. She didn’t want to give her name.

“It’s embarrassing when you have to come in here and you don’t have a job. It’s a pride thing,” she said. “I love my job and I do miss helping people. It’s like I’m stuck.”

Phillips oversees the volunteer-run food pantry, which depends on local donations and supplies from the state’s Emergency Food Assistance Program (EFAP) for monthly distributions in Klamath, Crescent City and Smith River.

EFAP supplies about 700 pounds, or $3,000 a month, worth of food to RHS, which uses the supplies to provide 700 households with one box at each distribution.

RHS also works through the Community Assistance Network (CAN) to glean surplus food from local grocery stores. CAN serves roughly 1,500 households through its own food assistance programs.

“You have pats of butter?”  Phillips asked into a telephone receiver one recent morning, perking up at the prospect of a donation.

Volunteer Cathy Long fills bags for the RHS food bank. Del Norte Triplicate/Bryant Anderson

Simple fare for most kitchens, butter is a big deal at RHS, where fresh food can be hard to come by.

“A box includes stuff you could make three or four meals out of. That’s it,” Phillips said.

People are eligible for one emergency food box every four months.

Those in need range from children to the elderly; middle income families to indigents, he said.

One in three local children are “food-insecure,” meaning they don’t have access to regular healthy meals, according to a recent study by Feeding America.

The average cost of a healthy meal in Del Norte County is $2.89, the study concludes. RHS spends just under $5 on food per household it serves, per month.

RHS is putting together 250 special baskets this year, each containing a turkey or chicken and fixings, for a holiday meal. The project relies on local generosity and volunteers.

Del Norte Unified School District employees typically buy the turkeys — they donated  $1,552 to the project last year and coordinator Maureen Jahn reported the drive is well under way. The Boy Scouts are out about town today collecting donations. People can drop non-perishable items in boxes in Crescent City at Chetco Federal Credit Union at 660 L Street, Ray’s Food Place at 625 M Street and Les Schwab Tire Center at 1105 Northcrest Drive.

While a number of businesses and individuals have already donated, RHS still needs some items for the Christmas baskets, especially boxed cake and biscuit mixes, stuffing, canned vegetables, cranberry sauce, gravy, pie filling and milk, as well as fresh potatoes, celery, onions and bread rolls, to name a few.

“Donations have been a little slow coming in. We are still hopeful that we are going to get some monetary donations as well,” said RHS organizer Kim Hernandez.

For more information, including how to donate, food distribution times and how to sign up for a Christmas food basket, visit: www.ruralhumanservices.com or call 707-464-7441.

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