Eden's Pantry Blesses the College Place Community

Back in 2019, when Troy Fitzgerald, associate pastor of Walla Walla University Adventist Church (College Place, Wash.), heard about students who experienced food insecurity, he began to develop the idea of a food pantry. He teamed up with Jonathan Simons, a student in the master’s of social work program at WWU who had been doing some research and had started conversations about the need of a pantry. They worked on the organization during the spring and summer of 2019 and then the WWU Church launched Eden’s Pantry in October of 2019.

 

At first, Pastor Fitzgerald started collecting food in his cabinets as church and community members responded with support. Then people brought food donations to Andy’s Market and donated funds to the church. To cultivate a warm environment for students and a home-away-from-home feel, church members served a soup meal. Students from WWU gathered at the pantry to shop on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays, from 5-8 p.m. The group was small but eventually there were 250-350 students registered at Eden’s Pantry and by January, 70-80 students were coming each week. 

Because of the overwhelming support for Eden’s Pantry, the students and the pantry team were also able to packaged up food baskets for families. These were delivered on the weekends. 

 

In 2020, COVID-19 changed everything. The university campus closed, and students continued their education online. Despite this, more than 250 students still lived in campus housing. And because there was still a need, students were scheduled to come into the pantry one at a time. They now have about 30-40 students a week receiving food.

 

In April, Eden’s Pantry received a call from United Way. Both United Way and the Education Service District (ESD) were concerned about the families whose children in pre-schools normally had their meals provided. They had heard about Eden’s Pantry and asked if the church would be willing to be the staging area for gathering and giving out food. The church said, “Yes.” WWU church members also donated food, funds and time. On April 19, ESD and the United Way worked together with Eden’s Pantry to deliver food baskets to 35 families in the area.

 

Recently Pastor Fitzgerald was interviewed and placed on the public school district board in College Place (CPPS). The College Place schools wanted to do a service project for their community and so they partnered with Eden’s Pantry to hold a city-wide food drive. 

 

This initiative, called “College Place Cares,” sent volunteers door-to-door on May 18 to pick up bags of food left on the doorsteps of almost every home in College Place. In just 6 hours, the youth room was filled to overflowing with food as well as the church fellowship hall. For the next few days volunteers sorted the food at Eden’s Pantry; WWU donated $1,000 of fresh fruit; and church members gave thousands of dollars to purchase food.

 

On May 21 the “College Place Cares” volunteers (teachers, administrators, students, and parents) worked with Eden’s Pantry to dispense food to the community. Through this beautiful collaboration they served 350 care packages that day. They ran out of food but the last few cars that drove in still received gift cards to purchase food.

Eden’s Pantry plans to prepare for serving students again in the fall of 2020. They also hope to find a way to better serve the needs of their community. CPPS plans to partner with the pantry to offer another food drive. 

 

Eden’s Pantry is an Adventist Community Services (ACS) ministry serving from the hearts of members of the WWU Adventist Church.