INDIANAPOLIS — On the south side of Indianapolis Friday, community leaders came together outside the Love Your Neighbor Center to officially announce the opening of a new food pantry.
"It really is a collective team effort in order to serve our neighbors to the best of our ability," said Crystal Wiley, director of Love Your Neighbor Center.
The food pantry has been a long time coming.
"It's been about 18 months since we purchased the building, and it took us all of six to seven months just to get the doors open," said Paul Ainslie, president of Indianapolis Council of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul.
Saturday is the first official day the pantry on Churchman Avenue will open to the community — a community in need due to a lack of grocery stores near the area.
"There are a few food pantries kind of distant from here, but the area of Norwood, which is just north of here, and a historically Black neighborhood from the Civil War era, is grossly underserved. Forty-six percent poverty rate is the latest data I've seen," Ainslie said.
He said St. Paul de Vincent has two other pantries in the Indianapolis area.
"The need is greater every week, every month for food in this community and inflation is part of it. Part of it are people that are coming here, transient or are just moving in the area and need food for a couple weeks. Whatever it is, we see a 1,000 new families every week at our big pantry," Ainslie said.
He's seen inflation has really hit many Hoosiers hard.
"Everybody's rent gone up. Utilities have gone up. We give them a little budget relief. They can come and get a few hundred dollars worth of food from us and that's a few hundred dollars they have to pay rent or to pay medical bills or to pay utilities," Ainslie said.
Those at the Love Your Neighbor Center food pantry estimate serving more than 700 families a month.
"You feel great that you can serve that gap and that you can be a part of that process of knowing that people get food in their bellies," Wiley said.
The Love Your Neighbor food pantry will be open Wednesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays from 9 - 11 a.m.
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