(Butler, PA) She left Butler County Community College’s Pioneer Pantry after attending class on a recent afternoon, her paper bags filled with food, her mind with relief.
The 24-year-old single mother of two children is among BC3 community members who benefit from the college’s partnership with the Alliance for Nonprofit Resources.
The Alliance for Nonprofit Resources, Butler, provides services to organizations, nonprofits, businesses and governmental entities, and has supplied food to BC3’s Pioneer Pantry monthly since the pantry opened in September 2019.
“It is a wonderful partnership, and extremely important and beneficial to the BC3 community,” said Karen Jack, project director of the college’s Keystone Education Yields Success program. “It gives us a steady stream of food. It also makes it very convenient. They don’t have to drive to another pantry.”
There are 32 locations in Butler County that the Alliance for Nonprofit Resources supplies with food. BC3’s Pioneer Pantry is one of them.
“It is a wonderful partnership, and extremely important and beneficial to the BC3 community. It gives us a steady stream of food."
BC3 community members registered with the Alliance for Nonprofit Resources in 2021 received from BC3’s Pioneer Pantry food to serve 499 individuals, said Mikayla Moretti, the college’s director of special events and like Jack a member of the college’s food security team.
BC3’s Pioneer Pantry also provides separate food to BC3 community members who are not registered with the Alliance for Nonprofit Resources, including those who do not live in Butler County, Moretti said.
Food security, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, “means access by all people at all times to enough food for an active, healthy life.”
Food insecurity in Butler County “is a lot more widespread than people know,” said Dr. Sandra Curry, manager of a Community Action Partnership that works with the Alliance for Nonprofit Resources. “COVID-19 certainly impacted that because people weren’t working.
“I think it affects a much broader economic spectrum that people may not want to admit. I think it doesn’t just affect the very low-income folks. There may be a lot of other people who have occasional struggles.”
Nearly 40 percent of BC3 students who responded to a 2018 survey indicated they experienced low or very low food security.
“To be food-insecure means they may not have the time to spend on their studies,” Moretti said. “When you are not meeting those basic needs of having food and proper nutrition, that just takes a toll on everything else in your life.”
Added Curry: “If you are not physically healthy, then you can’t take care of your kids. You can’t attend school at your best.”
BC3’s Pioneer Pantry is open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Mondays and Tuesdays through May 10.
The Alliance for Nonprofit Resources in February, Moretti said, provided BC3’s Pioneer Pantry with orange and apple juices; cans of mixed fruit, mixed vegetables, tuna and tomato soup; bags of kidney beans; boxes of oatmeal, macaroni and cheese, and cheeseburger and tuna meal starters; jars of peanut butter and butter.
“The food pantry definitely helps me. It’s nice because when I run out of things, I get food from the pantry. This definitely shows that BC3 cares ..."
Some of which found its way into the paper bags the low-income single mother and BC3 associate degree student placed inside the trunk of her vehicle before driving home to her 3-year-old daughter and 1-year-old son.
“The food pantry definitely helps me,” she said. “It’s nice because when I run out of things, I get food from the pantry. This definitely shows that BC3 cares, and that if you need assistance, they have all kinds of resources to help.”
