By Brian Ojanpa
LE SUEUR — Just as it takes a village to raise a child, a whole-community effort has given the Le Sueur Food Shelf some needed breathing room.
And with Le Sueur County’s high unemployment rate, it couldn’t have come at a better time.
“I’ve lived here since 1977. I’ve been involved in a lot of organizations and fundraising projects, and I’m just never surprised at how this community can come together,” said Food Shelf board vice president LaRayne Jensen.
The shelf’s new quarters in the city’s former fire hall is quadruple the size of its former site in the city’s hospital.
“That location was less than desirable, to say the least,” said board president, the Rev. Carl Bruihler.
A multiple-entity community effort launched months ago made the Food Shelf expansion possible, and the organization will tip its hat to townspeople with a 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. open house Sunday.
“It was just overwhelming,” Jensen said of the relocation effort that snowballed to involve the city of Le Sueur, the town’s supermarket, service clubs, and volunteers of all ages.
“People just kept coming and coming to help us move,” Jensen said. “It only took us 45 minutes to move out and 45 minutes to move in.”
She said even the mayor and superintendent of schools pitched in.
It was city officials who came up with the idea of leasing the fire hall to the Food Shelf for the token sum of $1 a month.
The 1,200-square-foot Food Shelf occupies two garage bays of the building, and the move was aided by more than $7,000 in donations from the Lions, Rotary Club and other sources.
Commercial freezer and refrigeration units were acquired, and Rademacher’s supermarket customers bought specially assembled food packages for the facility, with the supermarket matching those dollars spent and donating the money to the Food Shelf.
For the past 25 years, the operation was located in a lower level 300-square-foot space in the hospital, reachable only by stairs.
Jensen said there was no room for storage, and when patronage doubled last year, space and accessibility issues magnified. Moreover, the hospital wanted to reclaim that space for its own needs.
Bruihler said that brought an urgency to the situation.
“We basically got booted out of there,” he said.
Food Shelf user Susan Boisjolie, who has chronic lung problems, said the new quarters are a godsend.
“There’s a lot more space, and it’s not down the basement. Those steps were murder,” said Boisjolie, who worked until a couple of years ago, when family health issues forced her to quit.
“I took care of my dad, then I needed someone to care for me.”
She recalls her first visit to the Food Shelf.
“It was disheartening and embarrassing. But what are you gonna do? You’ve got to eat.”
The Food Shelf provides 5,000 pounds of food a month in a county with 9.2 percent unemployment, highest among Mankato-area counties and above the state average of 8 percent.
Jensen said although patrons’ needs are better met in the new facility, there’s still one sector being underserved — by choice.
“We’re really trying to reach out to people over 65. That’s a group that has a lot of pride.”
She said confidential food deliveries can be arranged for those reluctant to visit the Food Shelf.
