Economic Squeeze sending more families to food pantries
According to Shelly Boryswiewicz, spokesperson for Catholic Charities USA, the number of people seeking assistance from Catholic Charities’ outlets along with other nonprofit assistance agencies is growing by leaps and bounds. People arrive, seeking food to make it to the end of the month, assistance in paying utilities or money to fill their tanks so they can get to work.
“A sobering 85 percent of local Catholic Charities agencies” report an increase in the number of requests for help with utility bills, 77 percent of agencies report more people looking for meals or groceries, and 78 percent of the agencies have more families needing help paying mortgages or rent, said Boryswiewicz.
Locally, reports by People’s Resource Center (PRC) in Wheaton as well as the Catholic Charities agency for the Diocese of Joliet (DOJ) mirror national trends. Covenant Member Mary Ellen Durbin, who is the executive director of the PRC, said the organization is under pressure to satisfy needs that don’t look to be going away any time soon.
“In the face of increased needs, we are expanding our capacity to help people. As the economy shrinks, its resources shrink,” she said. In an effort to make PRC services more available to people with a limited ability to get to Wheaton, the organization is slated to open a 4,500-square-foot facility in Westmont on July 2. “It’s a major step in faith for us. There’s not a lot of evidence that the economy is going to lead to development to provide funding for this expansion. But we’re committed,” she said. Although the Westmont branch is about one-third the size of the Wheaton-based facility, it is expected to be a full-service operation, Durbin added. For the past several years, the PRC has had a presence in Westmont, offering a food pantry. For all other services, Westmont clients had to come to Wheaton. “It was difficult for people,” said Durbin. The facility will offer clients assistance with food, clothing, housing and job training along with computer classes and adult literacy courses. Artistic outlets will be available on site as well. With the rate of growth in the number of clients coming to the PRC, Durbin said more volunteers are needed. Check the Web site, http://www.peoplesrc.org/ for volunteer applications.
In spite of a persistent economic slump, Durbin said, “faith drives us. We count the number of new clients each month, but generally there’re over 100 new families coming in each month.” They’re mostly looking for food for the first time or enough to make it till the end of the pay period. “Some of these families are newly arriving refugees, but the majority is (comprised of) permanent residents who have fallen on hard times.”
A lot of people are attempting to grapple with hourly cuts in their work week or loss of employment because everybody is cutting back. Small projects around the house and even those planned for corporate facilities have been put on the back burner, according to the stories that Durbin and her staff hear from PRC clients.
At Catholic Charities DOJ, which serves people in DuPage, Will, Kendall, Grundy, Kankakee, Iroquois and Ford counties, the increase in the number of requests has really put pressure on the agency’s resources, according to Lorri Nagle, spokesperson. “What we’ve seen in the last year is an increase by 50 percent in the number of young children coming in for noontime meals” at the Shepherd’s Table, a soup kitchen in Joliet.
“There’re just so many ripple effects. People are really stressed,” she added. Meanwhile, a 67 percent cut in federal funding for emergency food and shelter programs has forced Catholic Charities and other agencies to seek “creative” ways to continue to provide services. Nagle said staff leaders are working to find donations enough to continue providing meals to clients at Hope House, rent and mortgage assistance to people at risk of homelessness and emergency assistance. For more information, check http://www.cc-doj.org/.