

If we do, we’ll crash out the whole program because we’re biting off more than we can chew.” A woman fills up her cart with food at the Reaching Out Community Services food pantry. We can no longer accept new clients while still maintaining those who are pre-registered. “A lot of the food that we were able to secure through the Food Bank for NYC or City Harvest has been cut by almost 50%. “We still have a lot of people who want to come and receive food, but we are not able to handle it because we don’t have the same resources now,” Neve says.
#Donate food nyc registration
No new registration for food due to supply shortage.’ Outside of the food pantry, a bright green sign reads ‘Sorry. The organization is part of his life-long mission to help his neighbors, but this year he had to do something he’s never done before: turn people away. Thomas Neve is the founder of RCS and has been overseeing its food pantry since 2007. Photo: Andrea Pineda-Salgadoīigger food pantries, like the one at Reaching Out Community Services (RCS), are also struggling. Food pantries are being forced to turn people away for lack of supply. We decided to cap it at 500 people because we can no longer afford food or to give food to so many,” Garces says. “At this point, we said this is not sustainable, we don’t have enough funding to do this. This past April, need swelled to 623 families. At the beginning of the pandemic it was serving nearly 200 families each month. Its food pantry is entirely funded by donations and operates on the second Saturday of each month.

Silvia Garces is the co-chair of the Lion’s Share Food Pantry that operates out of St. People line up outside Lion’s Share Food Pantry. Food pantries across the five boroughs are struggling to help the many New Yorkers in need amid the rise in food prices for even the most basic food staples. Two years later, photos of long food pantry lines are no longer circulating, but it doesn’t mean the lines are any shorter and there isn’t a food crisis. Photos of hundreds of people standing in line at food pantries with empty carts and shopping bags waiting to be filled circulated on the internet - people were hungry and food pantries were there to help. At the pandemic’s peak, thousands of New Yorkers received help from food pantries across the five boroughs.
