Cascade Food Pantry Inc

The Cascade Food Pantry opened January 2011 to provide supplemental food to those in need.  It has become a welcome place for everyone in our valley to work together and meet the needs of our neighbors.  Each year, we have served an average of 350 households with approximately 20 volunteers each week from the local churches and our town to help distribute food.  Through generous donations, the Pantry was able to purchase a building with plenty of room to check people in, serve their needs with a selection process, set up shelves for canned food, and house a walk-in freezer and refrigerator to store perishable foods.  Through another donation to the Cascade Food Pantry, 32 garden beds, called Pride of the Pantry Plots, were built by Cascade High School students for people who wanted a small garden near the pantry building.  These people cultivated a plot, attended Victory Garden Classes, and grew 480 pounds of food this past summer.  The Pantry has also housed and taught Financial Peace University classes with 40 individuals successfully completing the nine weeks of instruction.  Last year, the Pantry served six community meals to 569 people through the help of volunteers.  We are very appreciative of the Idaho Food Bank in Boise who has a very organized process for those in the State to pick up food for each town's pantry.  Every two weeks, a volunteer takes the Pantry's trailer to Boise and picks up an average of 3,000 to 4,000 pounds of food.  This is combined with Food Drives supported by the school, churches, and community events for bi-monthly distributions.  The Cascade Food Pantry is open the first and third Thursdays each month to all who wish to enjoy a social time of friendship and to select food for their family.