Metropolitan Family Service helping families with much needed free food

PORTLAND Ore. (KPTV) – It’s set up day for the Metropolitan Family Service and their food pantry on the grounds of Parklane Elementary School.

In a time when costs are rising so fast, many families are having to make hard choices where to spend.

“The last two years, we’ve seen our numbers pretty much double and remain pretty steady lately,” said Metropolitan Family Service Program Manager Helen Vank. “With the price of food and gas prices up we’ve seen an increase in folks coming out to our pantries and needing the additional food support that we provide.”

Some people who will come here have students who go to the school, others are just from the neighborhood.

Some need the food every week, but Metropolitan Food Service says about 10 percent of the people they see every week are new to this outdoor food pantry.

“We have a lot of regulars who are used to it, used to the flow of it, but there are always new people who are really excited, ‘Oh this is free? This is available?’” said volunteer Vivian Matthews. “So yeah, new clients are always excited and grateful to be here.”

About half of the foods offered are fresh produce items and with the model, families can choose exactly what they want.

“We’ll set up and folks are able to walk through and take the items that they want and that they will use,” Vank said.

Open to anyone, no questions asked, more information is available here.

You can also donate to the Hunger Free Project by scanning the QR code in the picture below.

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