As demand increases and support declines, the Gateway Food Pantry is seeking assistance from the surrounding communities through its first-ever food drive on Sept. 14.
Comparing this year with last, food donations have been cut in half, while the number of those seeking weekly food assistance has increased by 30%. Add in the closure of three local grocery stores that the pantry relied on for food recovery — a process where grocery stores donate surplus food to food pantries and banks — and the situation looks even bleaker.
“Everything impacts us. If food prices go up, more people feel the pinch, and they need to use our services,” Patrick McKelvey, executive director of the Gateway Food Pantry, said. “Donations don’t go as far anymore; it’s less coming in. When you purchase tens of thousands of dollars’ worth of food, you really notice that price increase. What fits in (my shopping cart) for $1,000 a week is significantly less than what it used to be.”
As this was anticipated to a certain extent, the pantry doubled its food purchasing budget at the beginning of the year, though it was still not enough. The food purchasing budget has now quadrupled, though McKelvey still finds himself going over budget weekly.
“We used to be able to provide utility bill assistance and gas cards for our clients and temporary housing for the homeless; now all of those funds are essentially being utilized to ensure we have enough food to survive another week,” McKelvey said. “We can’t sustain that forever. We have not sacrificed quality or quantity for our clients. We are not handing them expired things. We are not decreasing the amount we give out. We know that our families rely on us, and that requires us to buy.”
To combat this, the Gateway Food Pantry — with the help of students from the Fox and Mehlville school districts, as well as volunteers from local churches — will be distributing bags to residences throughout the Mehlville, Oakville, Arnold, Imperial and Fenton communities for them to fill with non-perishable food items. Bags will be distributed on Sept. 6 at the latest, and all will be picked up on Sept. 14.
“I always tell people, ‘What do you think your kids would eat? My biggest client demographic is 5 to 18 (years old). Shop for them,’” McKelvey said. “You can go buy a bajillion peas and corn for way cheaper than you can get one premium item, so I think people naturally are like, ‘Well, I want to give more food.’ We really just care about meals and what best serves our clients. We don’t need volume. People need to think about what they would eat themselves. I don’t know if they would eat three cans of corn.”
Goods most in demand include breakfasts like Pop-Tarts, oatmeal and cereal; boxed items like mashed potatoes and pasta meals; cans of soup, tuna, chicken, potatoes, beans and pasta; and miscellaneous products such as jelly, fruit cups, fruit snacks, tomato sauce, rice and oil.
“We try to calculate things in meals here. I cannot send a kid to school with (a canned vegetable) and have them eat it, right? But if you give me one of those prepared Campbell’s Chunky soups or a Chef Boyardee, I can send a kid to school with that, and they can have a meal. That’s lunch, and it won’t be stigmatized,” McKelvey said.
Formerly the Arnold Food Pantry, the Gateway Food Pantry serves families in North Jefferson County and South St. Louis County. McKelvey, a member of the Mehlville Board of Education, became involved with the pantry in 2021 by helping former Mehlville board member Scott Huegerich during the school district’s annual “Fill up the Pickup” drive and “never looked back.” After volunteering for two years, he took over the executive director position in 2023.
“There’s nothing more personal than when I hand someone food and I know they need that to eat. It makes you feel something,” McKelvey said. “It sounds really corny, ‘I love to serve,’ but when I heard that 250 people who live within five miles of my house needed food … I couldn’t turn away.”
