By Stowell P. Watters
Staff Writer
    For several months, York county food pantries have been feeling the pinch of less food on their shelves. The Wayside Soup Kitchen at Jagger Mills in Sanford has been, for the past three years, the county’s only liaison for the “Food Rescue” program, which supplies more than 40 pantries with food provided to Wayside by restaurant and shopping-mart excesses, free of charge. In early 2007, Wayside announced they would be supplying this U.S.D.A approved food only every other month.
    Then the big announcement came.
    “A few months ago Wayside told all the pantries that they were done in York County, and immediately panic began to set in,” said Patricia Murray, secretary and family case-worker at the Salvation Army in Old Orchard Beach. “We get nearly all of the food we serve to people from this source. Without it, we thought, we would be doomed. We were extremely worried.”
    The Wayside Soup Kitchen, which is based in Portland, is cutting off all affiliation with York County and discontinuing work out of Sanford.
    “It is very expensive to have your agency spread between two places, and very inefficient to have staff traveling back and forth between Sanford and Portland,” said Elinor Redmond, executive director of the Wayside Soup Kitchen. “We are very fortunate to have had that space free of charge, but the cost of having two different bases was just too much. That is why we have decided to leave.” Redmond affirmed the kitchen will supply food through December.
    A Nov. 15 meeting between all of the York county food pantries and meal programs put worries to rest. There will be a food rescue program in York County when the Wayside Soup Kitchen leaves.
    “We will not skip a beat, I think that was a major concern with a lot of people,” said Barbara Wentworth, director of community building at The United Way of York County.
    Food pantries are kept in business by programs like the food rescue, which donate the excess food from restaurants, gardens and farms (in the summer) and super-markets. Without these programs, said Murray, non-profit organizations and pantries, such as the Salvation Army, would have to foot the bill for food.
    “We are non-profit, we do not have room in our budget for food. Because of the pinch we have been really short on food but luckily the Good Shepard Food Bank stepped up and donated to us a ton of food for Thanksgiving,” Murray said.
    Although the food will still be donated to the rescue program free of charge, there are costs involved in forming a new committee to take over at Jagger Mills.
    “You have to consider, we have trucks that require gas, drivers that need reimbursement and a budget that still needs consideration,” Wentworth said.
    Currently, she said, the committee is still in the process of formation and fund raising for the aforementioned costs. Wentworth said the change is positive, and the rescue program will be handled by a soon-to-be formed partnership and advisory board of food pantry representatives from York County.    
    Wayside at Jagger Mills is still accepting donations of food through the United Way of York County. Wentworth encourages anyone who has donations to call her at 985-3359.