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WASILLA -- Food pantries around the Valley are gearing up for higher than usual demand for holiday baskets to help residents short on money provide a Christmas meal for their families. "The two days before Thanksgiving, we served more than 560 people," said Eddie Ezelle, director of the Wasilla Food Pantry. "There is an increase of people in need."
Ezelle couldn't say how those numbers compared to last year -- the pantry doesn't have those records handy, he said. But serving that many people in the three hours the food pantry is open kept things busier than usual. Wasilla Food Pantry, run by the multi-church group Valley Christian Coalition, doesn't put together holiday baskets. It distributes boxes of food to families who stop by the food pantry at Good Shepherd Lutheran Church in Wasilla each week. But Ezelle said the agency also provides food to the Salvation Army Mat-Su Valley Corps for its holiday baskets. "We're all shooting for the same goal," he said. "Our goal is to get food to people who need it." TURKEY, HAM, TRIMMINGS More than 1,500 holiday food baskets are being prepared by churches and food pantries between Trapper Creek and Palmer this year. All are planning to distribute more baskets than they did last year. That list includes local food pantries -- several smaller churches or community groups may also be preparing donations for needy Valley residents. Holiday baskets are generally handed out at Thanksgiving and Christmas to people who can't afford to make the traditional holiday meals. At Thanksgiving the basket is generally a turkey with a box full of potatoes, gravy mix, cranberry sauce, sweet potatoes and other items. At Christmas, the box could include turkey or ham with all the trimmings. Many groups include extras such as noodles and rice or tuna to help meals go further for families feeding children who are home from school during the holiday break. Salvation Army Major Verna Hughes said her group saw higher-than-usual demand for holiday baskets at Thanksgiving this year. She expects to hand out about 600 Christmas baskets, well over last year's number of 535. Hughes said the demand for holiday baskets and emergency food from the Salvation Army's food pantry is up about 10 percent this year. Even more dramatically, an outreach program run by Crossroads Community Church on Tait Drive near Wasilla is planning to more than double the number of Christmas baskets it makes this year, from 225 to 500. Sean Carpenter, vice president of Blood -N- Fire Outreach for Food and Clothing, said his group easily went through the 500 Thanksgiving baskets they put together last month. "There are lots of people in the Valley who are in need," Carpenter said. The group has been serving the needy in the Valley for more than five years but mostly on a word-of-mouth basis. It partners with some human-service agencies to help people in distress, and it draws on donations from its congregation of more than 1,000 and from other churches to stock its food pantry. EFFECTS OF ECONOMY Farther up the Parks Highway, church and community food pantries are seeing their list of "regulars" grow. "Our numbers are higher than they've ever been. We're serving over 225 families a month. I think last year, it was about 190," said Jenny Krepel, administrator of the Trapper Creek Community Food Bank, which serves Trapper Creek, Sunshine and Talkeetna. Krepel said about 50 seniors rely on the food bank to fill in where their fixed incomes stop. Several families who use the food bank rely on it only during the winter, when seasonal jobs are over. Some are clients who moved to Alaska to find that wages are lower and the cost of living is higher than they expected. Fran Lynch, who directs the Willow United Methodist Church food pantry, said a tough fishing year and a slow construction season have driven up the number of people in need of food in the Willow and Houston area. "We had some people in May who said, 'You won't see me anymore, I got my job for the summer,' and then we saw them in July," she said. "We're seeing people who are working -- maybe working minimum-wage jobs -- and the money is not stretching as much." Several food pantries said they still need items for holiday baskets. Others needed items not for baskets but to replenish their shelves so they can help families in January and February. "It's wonderful that people give to us during the holidays but there's definitely a need around the year. We don't want to have bare cupboards in January," Ezelle said.