Food insecurity impacts one in four San Diegans, according to Hunger Free San Diego, and a local organization is stepping in to assist those affected.
“Usually about, right now it's about 104 families a week that we service, which has grown. Before, when we started two years ago, it was about 55 to 60 families a week," said Debra Benson, coordinator of the food pantry at the Imperial Beach Neighborhood Center.
Founded in 2018, Imperial Beach Neighborhood Center provides food assistance to local families and outreach services for those experiencing homelessness.
Benson says the center partners with several organizations to help stock their pantry. The pantry is open Monday through Thursday from 9 a.m. until noon and the center also hosts a mass food distribution every third Thursday of the month.
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They provide items such as canned food, cereals, rice, water, fruits and vegetables.
“It helps with the groceries. Sometimes I spend over $300 just buying food alone," Michael told NBC 7.
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Michael has been coming to the center for the past three years to help feed his family of seven. He says he is the only breadwinner and relies on the center to help him provide for his family.
"It helped reduce the amount of costs that you incur because I can tell the difference in the prices from year to year," Michael continued. "It would be very difficult if I had no access to extra food. It would be very impossible because I live on one salary. So it would be very, very difficult for me to handle my rent, my electricity."
Out of the 795,000 total people estimated to be nutrition insecure in San Diego County, 204,000 of them are children, 163,000 are older adults (age 60+), and 135,000 of them are living with disabilities, according to the Hunger Free San Diego.
The organization says they see an uptick in families during the summer months.
"Some families come in seven, families of eight, and families of six. They don't bring all the kids with them at the same time, but there's a need for food security," Benson said.
A garden at the center helps provide fresh vegetables to families in need and helps them gain access to healthy foods.
“All this food goes right to the pantry. So this is the freshest fruit you'll ever find, the freshest vegetables you'll ever get, because if it goes from here, right to the table," said Michael, coordinator of the garden.
A garden is helping the center alleviate a problem it faces, which is getting food.
"The biggest challenge we have is getting food. We don't need the food that people have in their pantry like cream of mushrooms because that only goes so far. We need to be able to provide staples so that when families come to the pantry and put together an actual meal," said John Griffin-Atil, executive director of the Imperial Beach Neighborhood Center.
Griffin-Atil says they are looking to develop strategic food banks around the community to help meet the needs of the community.
On top of providing a meal pantry, the organization also prepares ready-to-eat sack lunches for homeless individuals given out every Saturday at their shower program.
The food pantry is on a first-come, first-serve basis. No identification is required. For more details, click here.
