Manna collects for the holiday season




HELPING HANDS—Above, Savanah Parker, right, of Camarillo sorts food at Manna food bank on Dec. 8 in Thousand Oaks. Below, Evan Denworth of Moorpark also helps out. Photos by BOBBY CURTIS/Acorn Newspapers

HELPING HANDS—Above, Savanah Parker, right, of Camarillo sorts food at Manna food bank on Dec. 8 in Thousand Oaks. Below, Evan Denworth of Moorpark also helps out. Photos by BOBBY CURTIS/Acorn Newspapers

It’s the time of year when people’s thoughts turn to giving. In the Conejo Valley, that often means a visit to Manna to drop off a food donation for the community’s less fortunate.

This year’s holiday rush is likely one of the last at the long-running food bank’s current location.

After three decades on Crescent Way, Manna is nearly ready to make renovations to its soon-tobe new home on Oakview Drive, formerly occupied by Shepherd’s House Foursquare Church. Shepherd’s House has moved to Townsgate Road.

 

 

“We are hoping to have architectural drawings done and begin renovations by the end of this year with the idea of completion in early 2019,” said Jennifer Schwabauer, Manna executive director.

Manna purchased the 3,000-square-foot church building for $840,000 in 2016. It provides almost four times the amount of space for staff to sort and store donations and for clients to select food for their families.

Food distribution to clients currently takes place three times a week. The extra room will allow the food bank to double the frequency of the distribution, serve more people at one time, provide shorter wait times, attract more volunteers and community partners, and offer classes, Schwabauer said.

FOOD FOR THOUGHT—Robbie Flynn of Newbury Park volunteers at the Conejo Valley food bank last Friday. BOBBY CURTIS/Acorn Newspapers

FOOD FOR THOUGHT—Robbie Flynn of Newbury Park volunteers at the Conejo Valley food bank last Friday. BOBBY CURTIS/Acorn Newspapers

“One of the things we’ve been thinking about is offering cooking classes with recipes for items we’ve got on hand at the time,” she said.

While Manna is busy planning for its future, food donations are up.

“We’re doing really well for this time of year,” Schwabauer said. “It’s not as crazy as it’s been in the past, because we’ve been working really hard with some of our food-drive partners and have spread them out throughout the year to kind of level out the food inventory highs and lows that Manna has experienced in the past.”

In addition, last year the organization changed its approach to the holidays.

In the past, the nonprofit closed down the regular pantry program for Thanksgiving week in order to focus on the holiday meal program, but after conducting a client survey and analyzing work-hours spent dedicated to a single meal, Manna’s made a change.

“We realized . . . that what they really wanted was the normal pantry,” Schwabauer said. “So when they come, they’ll get the normal pantry visit and get turkey or ham or whatever it is we get in, and then, in addition to that, they’ll get unlimited choice of things we have in our holiday section.”

Among other things, this allows clients of various cultural backgrounds to gather items traditional to their own family celebrations.

“As an example, a lot of our Hispanic clients didn’t want turkeys,” the director said. “They don’t know what to do with them because it’s not traditional in their culture, but they’re really happy to get chickens and they might make holiday tamales out of them.”

On its website, mannaconejo.org, Manna lists the most-needed items, including canned soups, stews, chili and beans as well as Hamburger Helper, hot cereal and macaroni and cheese. Financial donations, though, are always at the top of the list, Schwabauer said.

As always, as a nonprofit, money is our No. 1 request because in order to bring in the thousands of pounds of produce we get from our retail partners, we have to have refrigeration and our truck running and things like that,” she said. “Those are the behind-the-scenes expenses . . . but it’s the behind-the-scenes things that enable us to offer our clients so much more—and there’s always more need.”