By Michael Dinan
Staff Writer
Bertha Novella, 43, a central Greenwich resident whose two children entered the public school system when her family moved here from Peru 18 months ago, circled the shelves at the only food pantry in town yesterday afternoon, tipping a can of baked beans and a jar of peanut butter into a shopping cart.
“The food is important because I am one and one half years here in the United States and the food is for me and my children,” Novella said from the food pantry at Neighbor to Neighbor, a non-profit agency. “My daughter is 11 and my son is 14, and it is needed.”
Novella’s children are two of more than 600 Greenwich public schools students who qualify for free or subsidized meals and snacks under government-subsidized programs during the school year. But the program ends when school lets out, leaving hundreds of students in need of food through the summer.
To address the need, Neighbor to Neighbor’s board of directors decided to start a new program that allows clients of the pantry with school-age children to take home extra food until the academic year starts again. Officials at the pantry call the initiative the Summer Supplemental Food Program.
“All of our kids are more active, are home more in the summer and therefore they eat more,” said Julie Ricciardi, Neighbor to Neighbor’s president.
Normally, clients of Neighbor to Neighbor follow a point system that allows them to take home a certain amount of food, depending on family size. Under the new program, families with children ages 5 to 18 are granted extra points to take home additional helpings of fruit, vegetables, tuna fish, cereal, peanut butter, jelly and bread.
“This is extra, above and beyond what we already give out as a pantry,” Ricciardi said. “This is for families with kids at home who are eating more, and they just need the nutrition. We have a high nutritional value food pantry. We have whole wheat bread. We have fresh fruits and vegetables. We have milk. We don’t have Fruit Loops. We don’t have Hawaiian Punch. We don’t have hot dogs.”
Neighbor to Neighbor’s food pantry, at Christ Church Greenwich, relies entirely on monetary donations and donated groceries. The organization’s clients must meet strict income guidelines in order to qualify for the goods. Clients can earn no more than twice the federal poverty guideline, according to Kristen Kratky, Neighbor to Neighbor’s communications director. For a family of four, the qualifying income limit is about $3,442 per month, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The agency currently serves about 260 Greenwich families, Ricciardi said. In addition to the food pantry, which serves Greenwich families, Neighbor to Neighbor also provides shoes and clothing to people from Greenwich, Stamford, and Port Chester, N.Y.
Since it started about a month ago, nearly all families have taken advantage of the supplemental food program, Ricciardi said.
“They’re very grateful to have the extra food. I think they really need it,” Ricciardi said.
Increasingly, Neighbor to Neighbor has become more than a food source for families in crisis, but a regular source of sustenance for needy residents, human services providers say. As a result, and particularly with more food going out the door with the supplemental food program, the need for donations is rising, according to Mary de Barros, the pantry’s program director for two years.
“I’m always amazed with the generosity of people from this area,” de Barros said. “We always need more food and money to buy food, especially.”
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