The Batavia Interfaith Food Pantry and Clothes Closet has gotten settled into its new home, just in time for the holiday season.
Although the pantry began serving clients at its new facility at 916 First St. in Batavia last month, a ribbon-cutting ceremony was held Friday to celebrate the move into a larger location.
The new 14,000-square-foot facility offers expanded shopping, storage and office space to better serve local families, pantry officials said.
The pantry is open from 1 to 3 p.m. Tuesdays, 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. Wednesdays and Thursdays and 10 a.m. to noon Fridays, per its website. The organization’s services are open to anyone living in Batavia or Batavia Township.
Executive director of the pantry Eileen Pasero said the search for a new facility began over 10 years ago.
“We started more than a decade ago. Our old facility on 100 Flinn St. was being torn down and we were in temporary housing for two years while we were trying to locate an appropriate building,” Pasero said. “We purchased this one in June of last year and we’ve been working towards renovating it and we opened Oct. 1.”
The Flinn Street location had just over 4,000 square feet, and while the new facility has more space, it also requires more resources to fill it, something that Pasero believes will happen quite naturally.
“Having more space we will be able to stock more as one of the things with having more storage space is that we can take advantage of the times when we can get things at greatly reduced cost or free from the Northern Illinois Food Bank,” she said. “At the old location, I could get like one or two cases of something, but now with the expanded storage space, I have the ability to get 20 or 30 cases of something when it’s offered for free and take advantage of that.”
Jennifer Lamplough, chief impact officer for the Northern Illinois Food Bank, was on hand at Friday’s event and agreed the new facility could indeed take advantage of securing more food, noting that “space is one of the biggest obstacles” food pantries face.
“Aside from this being so much bigger and operations being better, this is great as it’s in the neighborhood for people here to use,” she said of the new facility. “It’s easy to get to and has open shopping and a low stigma experience like at a regular store. Food insecurity is higher than it’s ever been and having more room will help and this facility has the room to do it.”
Pasero credited securing a $3 million federal grant through U.S. Rep. Lauren Underwood, D-Naperville, with making the pantry’s new location possible.
Underwood was welcomed at the Friday event by a crowd of close to 200 people who stood outside in the parking lot of the building before the ceremonial ribbon-cutting.
“This is a dream come true,” Underwood said just before addressing the crowd. “Members of Congress are able to direct funding to like 15 projects every year and marking sure we address food insecurity is one of mine. Every year we have a food pantry we have been able to support.”
Underwood said the facility will be a major benefit to those in need in the Batavia area.
“They have room to grow and to help in other ways,” she said.
Batavia Mayor Jeff Schielke said the new location “is an ideal spot for the food pantry.”
“This is something that is going to serve the people of Batavia that truly need it,” he said.
Pasero said when all is said and done, the food pantry “will have to spend about $250,000 of our own money” on the new facility.
“Our board of directors knew we needed this larger facility and they have been working towards this for a really long time,” she said. “We had some savings already that was set aside for the project.”
Batavia Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Margaret Perreault attended the event and welcomed the new facility and the resources it will provide.
“We are thrilled. We are so happy they are finding their permanent home because they have outgrown their previous site a long time ago and there is so much need in our community,” she said. “Batavia is a generous community and wants to help those who need food and clothing. It’s a wonderful new building for an organization we want to celebrate.”
Both Perreault and Pasero noted how fortuitous it is for the facility to open up in the fall before the holiday season.
“This falls at the right time and we know that people here are in need and the food pantry knows people at this time will step it up and provide more assistance,” Perreault said.
“We were just talking the other day about this being open and how it was such good timing for us,” Pasero added. “People at this moment due to changes in the SNAP program and changing in the funding – just in the month of November alone, we’ve seen twice as many families as we normally do. Having the extra space and storage helps us to serve the families visiting us.”
For more information on the pantry, go to https://bataviafoodpantry.org/.
David Sharos is a freelance reporter for The Beacon-News.
