Dayton Metro Library has reduced its library food pantry sites from 10 to seven.
At the Main Branch downtown, it went from two to one distribution per month in October and the Southeast Dayton branch closed its pantry in the same month.
The library system also closed the Vandalia and Trotwood branch pantries in December after two years of operation.
The decision to close some of their pantries comes in response to a decrease in demand in those areas, said Ann Crichton, the library's community development manager. Its pantries also required more manpower to operate than the current staff could undertake.
“We just weren't seeing the return on investment for the other locations when we take into account the time and energy it takes in the staff standpoint," she said. "We felt like it was better to continue to push our patrons toward the locations that do distributions throughout the month rather than to try to maintain a location that maybe wasn't as heavily attended."
Dayton Metro Library started these pantries in their facilities to offer visitors access to vital services, she said, providing a one-stop option for many of their patrons.
"One of the things we realized is the library intersects with a lot of other service areas. So, for example, someone may be coming in to check out a job application or to get help applying for Social Security or unemployment benefits," she said. "Maybe they're coming in to bring their kid to one of our storytime sessions, and they can also pick up some of the resources that other service agencies have to offer, such as our food pantry distribution."
The library system receives much of its supplies from The Foodbank Inc. Donations also are often made financially or through area grocery stores.
"One of the things you'll notice if you do a food pantry distribution, you'll see that there are items that maybe are close to expiration date coming from some of the most popular places where you shop — Kroger, WalMart, Sam's Club, Dorothy Lane Market even. So we've done a really good job with The Foodbank of being able to capture those donations so that food is not going into a landfill someplace, but is actually being distributed to people who need it."
Up to 1,200 pounds of food are often delivered to the Main Branch. Sometimes they would see as many as three skids with boxes of produce, baked and canned goods that would arrive for staff to receive and stock the pantries with, Crichton said.
“Our main library is probably our largest distribution and we do once a month," Crichton said. "And I would say we can have anywhere from 50 to 100 people who come through once a month.”
Across all remaining branches, an assortment of products will continue to be available to choose from, including some meat and dairy products.
"This depends a little bit on which particular location you step into," Crichton said. "They either get canned goods and more nonperishable food items, or some of our pantries have refrigerator and freezer space. So they're actually able to do some more fresh dairy or meat or produce items, in many cases frozen things."
The library also no longer requires an ID to pick up food.
"We do ask you to verify your name and address and birthdate and so forth so that we know you're over the age of 18," Crichton said. "ID used to be a requirement or encouraged, and we're no longer asking for that information, per The Food Bank."
If visitors in the Vandalia, Trotwood or Southeast Branch area are looking for access to a pantry location, Crichton said they can look on The Foodbank's website or grab a resource card from any of the branches.
"All of our branch locations have a resource card, a community resource card, that will share with you the locations in certain areas that have prepared meals like House of Bread is one that's really popular downtown," she said. "But there are others throughout the county that are providing meal service or sack lunches, that sort of thing that can help you fill in that food gap if you are running short."
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