VALLEY CITY, N.D. (NewsDakota.com) – Until further notice the Barnes County Food Pantry no longer accepts can or box donations due to the COVID-19 virus in an effort to protect staff members and their volunteers.

In the interim, Pat Hansen said the Food Pantry is accepting monetary donations. She said staff members and volunteers will purchase the food directly from the local grocery store deliver the food to the Food Pantry.

The following is a commentary by Pat Hansen: “I am responding to a call I received on April 10th concerning the Barnes County Food Pantry in Valley City. The caller was very upset that we were taking only monetary donations and not accepting food products. She stated that everyone else in ND is accepting food products and called our request for monetary donations a “racket” to get money.

The Barnes County Food Pantry is located at the Senior Center in Valley City. We provide the service to the community free of charge. We do not charge any wages, rent, utilities, etc. to the Pantry. ALL of the money we receive goes to buy food and in some cases paper products, soap, shampoo and laundry soap for our clients. We purchase the food from local stores and volunteers package it for distribution. In this very trying time we do not want our Senior Center staff or our great volunteers to be exposed to the public any more than necessary. The volunteers are all in the highest risk category for COVID 19. In addition to the canned and boxed food, clients receive frozen meat and bread products and a voucher to purchase milk, eggs, bread and fresh fruits or vegetables at the local grocery stores. In the past month alone we reimbursed the stores $2,199.86 for food and vouchers. This is in addition to the food we purchase from the Great Plains Food Bank in Fargo and food donations we had prior to this crisis. We do not receive any federal, state or other government funding for the Pantry. 100% of our funding comes from generous churches, private individuals and local businesses in our community. Since July 1st we have spent $43,402.03 on food and supplies.

The main goals of our non-profit agency are to provide meals to senior citizens and public transit to the public in the eight counties we serve. We have our building closed to anyone but staff in order to protect the cooks and office staff from exposure. In Valley City alone we are providing an average of 100 hot meals per day, 7 days per week to the seniors in our community. In addition, our drivers continue to take passengers to the clinics, to work and grocery stores and to dialysis, cancer treatments, etc. in Jamestown and Fargo. Due to the current crisis we are providing rides free of charge to the public.

I hope that this information helps people to understand why we made the decision we did.”

Pat Hansen
Director