“We’re having an emergency right now. We need help. Our storage area is almost empty,’’ said Bill Woeste, president of the pantry’s board. “Just last June these shelves would have been full.”

Typically, the pantry orders and receives a weekly shipment of 5,000 to 6,000 pounds of food at either no cost or it purchases it for pennies on the dollar from the Shared Harvest Food Bank, Woeste said. That’s been down to 1,000 pounds the last few weeks.

Shared Harvest is receiving less food from the United States Department of Agriculture and donations of cash and food are down, said Terry Perdue, the agency’s executive director.

“We’ve seen a decline in donations – 10 percent across the board. Many people (and companies) are concerned about what’s happening and are (tightening) their purse strings.”

The food shipments and donations Shared Harvest receives are distributed in the five counties it serves – Butler, Darke, Miami, Preble, and Warren.

“We put limits on (what can be ordered) so everybody can access it,” Perdue said. “Otherwise, one pantry might take all our inventory.”

The Fairfield pantry provides a bag of food to families in its service area – the Fairfield City Schools, which includes the city of Fairfield, Fairfield Twp. and a small portion of both Lindenwald and Ross Twp.

Larger families may receive two bags of food, depending on their size, Woeste said. Families are eligible to get food once a month.

From October 2023 to September 2024, the Fairfield pantry served an average of 309 households – consisting of 1,182 people – per month, Perdue said.

Shared Harvest distributed a total of 178,124 pounds of food to the Fairfield pantry during that same period based on what the pantry ordered, Perdue said.

“We’ve always prided ourselves on a providing three days’ worth of nutritious food,’’ Woeste said.

But, without additional donations of food or cash “we’re about to cut back,” Woeste said.

The Fairfield Food Pantry is the only Shared Harvest Foodbank partner that does not serve all of Butler County, Perdue said.

Shared Harvest increased its total food distributed from 2023 to 2024 by 253,469 pounds, Perdue said. But the amount of food from federal sources dropped by 120,379 pounds.

“Shared Harvest is not the only source of food for our partner agencies. Many agencies also purchase food to supplement what they cannot obtain through us,” Perdue said.

“With the cost of food increasing so drastically, our pantry partners are able to buy less than what they could previously buy from retailers.”

At this time last year Shared Harvest, its member pantries, and related agencies on average gave food to 42,000 people monthly. Today that number is 48,000 to 50,000, Perdue said.

“The cost of food is driving people to our pantry lines. They have limited – often fixed – incomes in many cases,” Perdue said. “They’re buying less with what they have.”

Perdue said many pantries – like Fairfield’s – distribute shelf-ready bags with specific items.

Oftentimes, Shared Harvest gets donations of fresh produce to offer as an alternative to canned or other foodstuffs that might be in short supply. However, many partner pantries can’t accept fresh food because they don’t have freezers or refrigerators to keep the products or can’t distribute the items before they go bad.

To donate

Bring food or mail checks to the Fairfield Food Pantry, bring items from noon to 3 p.m., Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays to the pantry, 78 Donald Dr., Fairfield, OH 45014

The most needed items are: canned vegetables, soup, spaghettiOs, stew, ravioli, fruit, applesauce, peanut butter, jelly, spaghetti, spaghetti sauce, boxed potatoes or side dish, cereal, macaroni and cheese, snacks.

Call or email the pantry with questions about organizing a food drive or other matters: 513-829-9047 or fairfieldfoodpantry@gmail.com