During the current Covid Crisis, it became apparent very quickly that the issue of food insecurity was a cause of concern for many older people and families living in the south Dublin area.
The issue was raised with the Dublin South City Partnership through local community groups, drugs project and youth organisations. In particular, two issues were arising i.e. some older people who were cocooning had no family support and were unable to access food, and also many families who were supported through schools, after-schools, crèches and youth projects were under pressure to feed their families on substantially reduced incomes.
The Partnership began to examine how they could support communities in various areas. In Inchicore, a number of local organisations came together to focus on the identified need and to develop a food bank between them to lessen the impact of the crisis on local residents.
St. Patrick’s Athletic quickly offered their venue as a depot for the food bank as it was easily accessible and well known in the area. St Pat’s Community Officer David Morrissey said: “Richmond Park has unfortunately been closed for the past number of weeks, so as a club we thought, why wouldn’t we use our facilities as a hub”.
Dublin South City Partnership (DSCP), the Inchicore-based addiction services charity Frontline Make Change, and the Kilmainham-Inchicore Network set about identifying those who were struggling to pay for essentials through the various agencies that they collaborate with in the area.
DSCP supported by the Irish Local Development Network then sourced supplies from the Food Cloud, the not-for-profit organisation that supplies charities with unsold supermarket food and weekly deliveries commenced.
However, demand is such that the food sourced was not nearly enough with over 80 parcels going out to homes locally. DSCP supplemented the free food through funds from the Social Inclusion and Community Activation Programme while St. Patrick’s Athletic have been working with local businesses and private sources to source donations.
DSCP use their Tus Care and Repair vans to collect and deliver the food locally with the help of volunteers, staff of the various projects and members of the football club. One beneficiary of our Food Bank contacted us to let us know the difference the help had made to their family; “it was a choice between paying our Credit Union loan or buying food. We have always worked and paid our way, we never thought we would be in this situation”.
St. Patrick’s Athletic quickly offered their venue as a depot for the food bank as it was easily accessible and well known in the area. St Pat’s Community Officer David Morrissey said: “Richmond Park has unfortunately been closed for the past number of weeks, so as a club we thought, why wouldn’t we use our facilities as a hub”.
Dublin South City Partnership (DSCP), the Inchicore-based addiction services charity Frontline Make Change, and the Kilmainham-Inchicore Network set about identifying those who were struggling to pay for essentials through the various agencies that they collaborate with in the area.
DSCP supported by the Irish Local Development Network then sourced supplies from the Food Cloud, the not-for-profit organisation that supplies charities with unsold supermarket food and weekly deliveries commenced.
However, demand is such that the food sourced was not nearly enough with over 80 parcels going out to homes locally. DSCP supplemented the free food through funds from the Social Inclusion and Community Activation Programme while St. Patrick’s Athletic have been working with local businesses and private sources to source donations.
DSCP use their Tus Care and Repair vans to collect and deliver the food locally with the help of volunteers, staff of the various projects and members of the football club. One beneficiary of our Food Bank contacted us to let us know the difference the help had made to their family; “it was a choice between paying our Credit Union loan or buying food. We have always worked and paid our way, we never thought we would be in this situation”.
