In the spacious dining room at the Lockport Salvation Army’s facility on Cottage Street, for at least a couple of hours every Monday through Friday there’s a lot going on and it’s not all food-related.
Rows of tables set up along two walls hold an eclectic array of free stuff, from baked goods and fresh produce to articles of clothing and, for the past few weeks, informational displays about nutrition and mental health, with take-away flyers listing the names, locations and/or phone numbers of service organizations that can assist in specific crises: Save the Michaels of the World, Lockport CARES, Pinnacle Community Services.
It has long been said by Salvation Army staff and volunteers that the Sister Mary Loretto Memorial Community Soup Kitchen is a portal to other vital services for people who are struggling financially. Somebody coming into the soup kitchen for a free hot meal may end up getting the Salvation Army’s help covering their rent or utility bills, or get signed up with its food pantry and other programs such as Christmas Assistance.
This year the portal has been widened, as Salvation Army Majors Tom and Barbara Duperree and staff upped their networking game and invited other service providers into the soup kitchen to help cover gaps in the social safety net.
Save the Michaels, the addiction recovery support organization, mans a table once a week. Lifeline distributes free, simple phones on a monthly basis. Also coming in regularly are a Medicare adviser and a representative of EPIC, a nonprofit that among other things helps people catch rides to doctors’ appointments and shopping centers and has a program to help outfit first-time renters’ apartments. The aforementioned health info displays were left behind by a group of SUNY Niagara students who came in to do blood pressure screening and targeted health/wellness education on three different dates in October.
“We want to achieve for our community, especially the people who are most vulnerable,” Tom Duperree said. “Need couldn’t be stronger than it is today.”
Data provided by Christopher Gresart, social ministries coordinator, shows community use of the soup kitchen has been rising steadily since the end of Covid lockdown: almost 19,300 meals served in 2022, 25,900 meals served in 2023, more than 25,000 meals served in 2024. Per the numbers through October, it’s on track to exceed 28,000 meals served in 2025; the daily average is 115 meals served.
Throughout this year the Salvation Army has seen a growing number of requests for assistance, and there’s been a marked uptick in soup kitchen visitation in the past three months, according to Duperree. “Times are getting tougher and tougher. Prices just aren’t coming down,” he said.
In the wake of new, tightened rules of eligibility for the federally funded Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), as well as the hold on paying out SNAP benefits in November due to the U.S. government shutdown, the Salvation Army started seeing more “new faces” at both the soup kitchen and the food pantry. In some cases it’s the latter that people are looking for, as worry over the possible permanent loss of SNAP benefits sets in and they try to get signed up with multiple food pantries.
“They’re starting to come from Tonawanda, Niagara Falls, Buffalo,” Duperree said. “I tell them: one time only, have a meal at the soup kitchen, then go to your home pantry.”
Federal funding cuts are straining food banks as well. When USDA canceled The Emergency Food Assistant Program (TEFAP) earlier this year, FeedMore WNY estimated it would lose access to more than $3.5 million of food. For individual food pantries and soup kitchens, Duperree said, the consequences are fewer canned goods, less fresh produce, and reduced access to harder-to-get foods, meaning there’s less variety for clients.
Accommodating growing need with diminished traditional resources is the soup kitchen’s status as the Union-Sun & Journal’s 42nd annual fund drive for the soup kitchen gets underway today.
Despite rising costs, this year’s goal is the same as last year’s: $50,000. That’s an attainable goal, Salvation Army Advisory Board chair Brendan Conley observed — the 2024 drive hit the mark whereas the 2023 drive, which had a significantly bigger goal, didn’t come close.
Since the soup kitchen’s annual operating cost well exceeds $100,000, every dollar donated to it directly equals a dollar’s worth of relief for Salvation Army operations overall.
“We’re here and we’re available to the community,” Conley said. “We help people one at a time, one day at a time. We help now and reflect later.”
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In keeping with fund drive tradition, a clip-out, paper donation form will be printed daily in the US&J, beginning today and continuing through Dec. 24. Fill out the form, write your check to The Salvation Army of Lockport (and write “soup kitchen” on the memo line), and mail or bring both to: The Salvation Army, 50 Cottage St., Lockport, NY 14094.
There also are two electronic options for donating to the fund drive. Text SOUPSON to 31333 to be directed to a donation page, or use the QR code that’s published by the US&J online (lockportjournal.com) as well as in its print editions. The “in honor / in memory” designation is available.