Hereford food redistribution charity searching for new location to continue its services
St Martins Foodshare, which has been operating from St Martins Church, announced last week it would be temporarily closing its doors from the 31st October but is aiming to keep going by finding a new permanent base
A co-ordinator for a Hereford food redistribution charity has said it's "not shutting down" and it is looking for a new permanent location to continue to provide its services.
In a statement last week St Martin's FoodShare, which has been based in St Martin's Church for several years, confirmed it would be closing the service temporarily from Friday 31 October.
A spokesperson for the Diocese of Hereford at the time said it would be "stepping in" to find a "sustainable solution", and like many in the community were "hugely disappointed" to find out the FoodShare needed to temporarily close.
It added there had been an "unfortunate set of circumstances which resulted in there being no one to manage the project" and that it had "outgrown the resources of a small parish church", but as soon as it was made aware of the situation, a team at the diocesan office began working to try to put an interim solution in place.
In an update yesterday it said it had now put in place a project manager, who would be supporting by co-ordinating all those who have expressed support to seek to find a new location and new storage facilities for it.
The FoodShare, which is different to a food bank as it does not need someone to be referred to them to be able to use it, helps collect food from the likes of supermarkets which would otherwise be wasted and redistributes it.
Cat Hornsey is a co-ordinator from the team, she says they support hundreds of people in the area with the work they do and are focused on making sure they can continue moving forward.
"This isn’t a case of us shutting down," she said.
"There is a dedicated and very involved team who would like to see, and will see, FoodShare continue in the future.
“We are still collecting food, we are still trying to run our shares on Monday and Friday, we have run a food share yesterday, we hope to be able to run another Friday but the location is still to be confirmed."
She said for people to check for updates on the FoodShare's social media regarding future plans.