Two weeks ago, a woman from West Allis contacted Dorene Paley of the Jewish Community Pantry. She needed kosher meat and Passover food, and she wanted directions to the pantry.
Paley, director of community services for the Harry & Rose Samson Family Jewish Community Center, phoned the woman and told her not to come. The pantry, which is usually open once a week on Thursdays, was forced to close last week.
According to a March 13 report in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, the building at 3516 N. Center St. in Milwaukee’s central city that housed the pantry — and three private schools in the publicly founded voucher program — was closed after a city inspector declared it unfit for habitation.
Utilities had been shut off, there were various code violations and the building’s owner, Harambee Development Corporation, owes outstanding property taxes worth almost $100,000, according to the Journal Sentinel.
“I felt terrible because [the West Allis woman] really needed the help and I couldn’t send her anywhere else,” because no other pantry provides kosher food, Paley said.
“We are the only Jewish pantry in the Hunger Task Force’s pantry network. So we are the only ones to maintain a kosher section,” said Paley. “By losing our space, we can no longer serve the community.”
On March 12, rather than disbursing bags of food to people in need, volunteers helped the Hunger Task Force pick up the pantry’s perishable items. A week later, on March 19, movers collected the rest of the pantry’s stock — nonperishable food, refrigerators, freezers and other furniture — which will be stored until the pantry can find a new space.
The JCP is the only pantry in the 53210 zip code. It provides food to more than 5,000 households, almost 15,000 people, per year.
And the need is increasing. “Our numbers have increased 20 to 30 percent,” said Paley. “We are serving a lot more people now than we ever served.”
Though the majority of recipients are not Jewish, a small percentage of Jews, primarily immigrants from the Former Soviet Union and residents of the city’s west side, do use it.
Paley said that the closure is particularly painful because of its timing, just weeks before Passover, which, for many Jews, requires the purchase of foods specially kosher for that holiday.
“It’s kind of hurtful because we want to be able to provide them with what they need in addition to the regular foods,” said Paley.
Paley and pantry co-chairs Howard Karsh and Lil Teplinsky are pursuing leads for new buildings. Paley is optimistic.
“We figure there’s an angel watching over us,” she said, adding with a laugh, “But I think our angel is being overworked these days.”
Established in 1976, the JCP is a joint project of the JCC, the Milwaukee Jewish Council for Community Relations and the Milwaukee Jewish Federation’s Women’s Division.
The new space needs to be at least 3,000 square feet with outdoor access for clients, a bathroom, a wide delivery door and parking. It must be located on a bus line and be either on ground level or have elevator access.
The pantry is one of two central sources for free kosher-for-Passover food. The other is the Rabbi Scheinfeld Moath Chitim Fund, which annually gives food to hundreds of people before Passover.
Last April, as in years past, hundreds of people lined up outside the Kosher Meat Klub’s warehouse on Capitol Drive to pick up bags overflowing with food. Almost 400 families received food that day.
But this year, for the first time since the fund was started about 70 years ago, no money has been raised and no food will be given, according to Karsh, who administers the fund.
Karsh blames the fund’s closing this year on a lack of access to potential donors. “On a progressive level, the list has become more ineffective every year. There was a time when it actually paid for the campaign, but we’ve never been able to keep the list up to date,” he said.
The campaign has been funded by a gift from the estate of Samuel “Batty” Ginsburg, who died in 1998. Traditionally, all funds raised by the annual campaign are used to purchase food for distribution.
“The issue of the money was important,” Karsh said, “because we were relying on the money we collected to cover the cost of the actual food. That became impossible. Even with the money we were able to collect privately, that was not sufficient.”
Recipients have traditionally been members of the community who are elderly, disabled and isolated, and immigrants from the Former Soviet Union.
Karsh has communicated with Jewish community leaders but is “not sure how to proceed” for next year.
In response to lack of emergency food distribution through the Scheinfeld fund, many Jewish community bodies have responded with a new initiative, the Wisconsin Children’s Passover Project.
A collaboration of the pantry, the federation’s Coalition for Jewish Learning, Tikkun Ha-Ir of Milwaukee and the Wisconsin Council of Rabbis, the project will culminate with the distribution of some 300 sets of grape juice, matzah and gefilte fish.
Teen volunteers through the Teen Day of Social Action (a project of CJL and Tikkun Ha-Ir) will help distribute the food on Sunday, April 5, 10 a.m.-1 p.m., at the Jewish Home and Care Center’s Rubenstein Pavilion, 1410 N. Prospect Ave.
Food is now being collected through synagogues and day schools, and funds are being collected through the pantry.
“I can’t tell you how impressed I am about everybody pulling together from all parts of the community to put this together,” said Judy S. Baruch, executive director of Tikkun Ha-Ir.
“It’s an interesting and unexpected alliance. It shows that we can come together.”
Acknowledging that some people will be disappointed with the limited types and amounts of food offered, Baruch praised the project for providing necessary help.
“It will mean that we’ll give out 300-plus sets of food for seders that [otherwise] would not have happened,” she said.
Teen volunteers are welcome to help from 9 a.m. For more information about the food distribution, contact Baruch, 414-247-3750. To donate, contact Paley at 414-967-8217. Checks should be made out to Jewish Community Pantry.
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