Food shelf is looking for a place in Oakdale to hang its shelves

With the need growing, Place of Hope is searching for a place in Oakdale to open a new food shelf.

By KEVIN GILES, Star Tribune

Last update: August 12, 2008 - 7:44 PM

The quest for a location for Washington County's newest food shelf has Place of Hope living up to its name.

"God is teaching me patience," said Tammy Jensen-Boehne, who's trying to find a home for the food shelf in Oakdale. "We've had good responses from a lot of those people willing to help but they just don't have the building space."

Jensen-Boehne and other organizers of Place of Hope said that home foreclosures, sky-high gas prices and other signs of economic distress show the need for another community food shelf in Oakdale, Woodbury and Maplewood. They plan to include other kinds of help, such as ride shares and a free flu clinic.

The area has two other food shelves: Christian Cupboard in Woodbury and North St. Paul Area Food Shelf.

Jensen-Boehne, a former client at Christian Cupboard who also volunteered there, said she's starting Place of Hope to help offset hunger at a time of escalating financial misfortune. She said that Place of Hope won't compete with Christian Cupboard.

Several churches in Oakdale and Woodbury told her they don't have room for Place of Hope, she said, and some building owners in Oakdale were unwilling to donate space to Place of Hope if they can't take a tax deduction, she said.

"I don't know what the answer is," she said. "It's like we're fighting an uphill battle."

The need is growing

Hunger in Minnesota is surging, according to Hunger Solutions Minnesota. A rally in St. Paul last month kicked off Voice of Hunger Network, a grass-roots movement to spread messages about the extent of hunger in Minnesota and how to better distribute food.

Since 2000, the number of people using Minnesota food shelves has shot up 62 percent, with 2 million visits in the past year, Hunger Solutions said. That includes Washington County, where food shelves saw 10 percent more clients in 2007 than in 2006. The demand is evident in the amount of food given out at the five Washington County shelves that Hunger Solutions tracks: 176,000 pounds more in 2007 than the previous year, for a total of nearly 1.3 million pounds of food distributed.

Meanwhile, Jensen-Boehne said, the Second Harvest food bank has been asking her when Place of Hope will open. And an Oakdale resident recently told her he was turned away from other food shelves because he didn't live in the districts they served, she said.

"We will serve anybody once, even if they aren't from our area," she said. "Nobody judges. Everybody is treated with the utmost respect."

Jensen-Boehne has said that more people will turn to food shelves as gasoline and food prices continue to rise. She is a Brainerd native who has lived in Woodbury for nine years. She is a certified nursing assistant at St. John's Hospital in Maplewood.

Planning for Place of Hope began early this spring. The Woodbury chapter of Women Today, a fellowship and service organization, is backing Place of Hope.

Kevin Giles - 651-298-1554

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