Wesley Food Pantries in Corpus Christi and Robstown

In 1942, Wesley Community Center was founded to aid the less fortunate by providing food, children’s day care, clothing, and other types of assistance to families in Corpus Christi and Robstown, TX. In 2019, Wesley Community Center provided food to 19,110 individuals in 6,319 households, the majority of which were seniors or families with children under 18 years old. Our childcare programs successfully served 346 homeless CPS, and low-income children with high-quality childcare services at our Learning Centers in Robstown and Corpus Christi and served 34,592 nutritious meals (96% extremely low-income, 67% homeless, 95% minority). To date, our Mother & Child Home has provided permanent housing to 25 homeless mothers and 78 children.

Responding to the needs of our community as a result of the COVID 19 pandemic, we remain open and fully operational. We have adapted our service delivery to best serve our families in need. While our Learning Centers remain open, we have experienced a huge surge in the number of families requesting assistance from our Food Pantries-nearly 100% increase in the requests from just one year ago. Specific adaptations:

• Learning Centers in Corpus Christi and Robstown are still operating regular hours: M-F 7:00 a.m. - 6:00 p.m. We continue to serve the children of essential service workers and parents actively seeking employment at essential service businesses. With the new regulations, we are required to maintain the classrooms at the CDC, state, and local mandate of no more than 10 people and this includes the teachers. This has limited the number of children we can have on-site at any given time.

• The Food Pantry at Corpus Center continues to operate regular hours: M-F 9:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m. The Food Pantry at Robstown Center has extended its operating hours from M-F 9:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m. to M-F 9:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m. Our Robstown site is the only pantry open regularly M - F in rural Nueces County. To meet the demand, we have had to purchase food weekly to meet the need. The largest age groups served by the pantry are families with children and senior citizens 55+.

• Mother & Child Home remains open 24/7/365 and provides permanent housing to approximately six families at any given time.

To put these 2020 numbers in prospective, in 2019, our food pantries in Robstown and Corpus Christi, provided food to 19,110 individuals in 6,319 households, the majority of which were seniors or families with children under 18 years old. Our childcare programs successfully served 346 homeless CPS, and low-income children with high-quality childcare services at our Learning Centers in Robstown and Corpus Christi and served 34,592 nutritious meals (96% extremely low-income, 67% homeless, 95% minority). To date, our Mother & Child Home has provided permanent housing to 25 homeless mothers and 78 children.

The ultimate goal of all Wesley programming is to provide food, clothing, childcare services, and permanent housing to individuals and families as they stabilize their lives. We understand that the economic impact of COVID 19 will continue even after community restrictions are lifted. The low-income families that we serve live paycheck to paycheck on the edge of financial security. As we step forward in faith, I respectfully request a grant of $2,500 to help these families to bridge the gap during this unprecedented world event by providing them with food from our Food Pantries in Corpus Christi and Robstown. ($2,500 will provide over 1,250 meals for those in need.) Together, we can make an immediate positive impact in the lives of these families.