WACO, Texas (KXXV) — Shepherd's Heart, a faith-based pantry relies on community support as they continue to serve and gear up for the busy holiday season
- The demand is still high post-federal government shutdown, as the holidays are around the corner, and this food pantry is keeping up with the demand by expanding their distribution days
- This Saturday, November 22, Shepherd's Heart is teaming up with the Central Texas Food Bank handing out food from 9-11 a.m. at Waco ISD Stadium for the Thanksgiving holiday
- For more information on food distribution days, click here.
BROADCAST TRANSCRIPT:
The CEO of the nonprofit Shepherd's Heart, Robert Gager, says the large demand for food continues during the shutdown, and they increased their food distribution days from three to four. As Thanksgiving approaches, more days will be added to the schedule, meaning the need for food is still there and things will not change overnight.
"Just because the government shutdown is over doesn't mean that the people already have the funds that they need. That takes a while. It's kind of like a train that stopped dead on a track. Takes a while to get that thing moving. It's the same thing with the government, the way that all of that works, you just can't flip a switch and everybody's got their money. It takes a while to go through," Gager said.
Despite the challenges, Gager says the community has stepped up during the crisis.
"This past couple of months that we've been going through this crazy crisis, we've seen a great turnout from the community. What we do as a pantry, we're a faith-based pantry, we don't have government money running through it, and it's what we do with the community's help with our retail store and with the community's help to make all this happen. And we've seen a wonderful outpouring of people volunteering and donating money and just been wonderful," Gager said.
This Saturday, from 9 to 11 a.m. at Waco ISD Stadium, the Central Texas Food Bank will be hosting a food distribution event, and Shepherd's Heart is participating. Gager says they're expecting significantly more people than their usual distribution events.
"Instead of feeding, we might feed about 380 people at the health department. We're trying to feed 1,000 families this Saturday. So we're moving, we're not going backwards. We're just running as fast as we can to keep up with the need. We've got more people coming at us for needs than we have time to answer the phone sometimes," Gager said.
The event will include turkey distribution for families in need as Thanksgiving approaches.
"I don't know how many people will get turkeys, but the first probably 500 will get turkeys, and then we got meat for other people," Gager said.
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