Tigard church food pantry feeds hungry families

Tigard Covenant Church keeps pantry open on a wing and a prayer

By Geoff Pursinger

The Regal Courier, Nov 25, 2009

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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 across Pacific Highway from King City, 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 food. "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 even received leftover Halloween candy from a local resident, which they planned to distribute to some of the kids.

"The most important thing for us is to give people nutritious meals," Woolverton 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, according to Woolverton.

This all stems from David Greenidge, the church's pastor for the past five years, who 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 in 2005-2007, 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.

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