"It's not just homeless people, drug addicts or alcoholics...These are people out trying to do the best they can, and it's just not good enough."

More proof that people experiencing homelessness should not be stigmatized, ostracized, marginalized, silenced and forgotten....

Pantries not just for homeless anymore

'Working poor' seek assistance

BY JOHN A. TORRES • FLORIDA TODAY • June 22, 2008

Jennifer Sage of Merritt Island helps her son, Oscar, 2, eat his dinner. (Craig Rubadoux, FLORIDA TODAY)

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COCOA -- Jennifer Sage never visited a "sharing center" or food pantry before the last week of May.

Then she visited several.

"This is to supplement things," said the married mother of two as she waited for her first bags of groceries from the Central Brevard Sharing Center. "Just this last week, I went to Catholic Charities and to a another church program for assistance as well."

Until the past few months, things were going smoothly for the couple and their 2-year-old and 5-year-old children living on Merritt Island.

Sometimes they struggled, but never had to seek assistance.

Sage called her family working poor.

But recently Sage's secretarial job was cut to two days a week.

And the rising cost of gasoline has hurt her husband's construction job paycheck because he commutes to Orlando every day.

"My husband drives the family station wagon now, and I'm stuck with an SUV we can't give away," she said, adding that he recently switched to four 10-hour days to save gas money.

With only a high school diploma and the high cost of child care, Sage knows her options for employment are limited.

But, she said, her husband makes too much money for the family to qualify for food stamps or other forms of government assistance.

Sage is not the typical Sharing Center client, but Director Ed Price said more and more like her are showing up for help.

"It's not just homeless people, drug addicts or alcoholics," he said "These are people out trying to do the best they can, and it's just not good enough."

During the past three months, more than 700 new clients have registered for help.

"We continue to see people that we haven't before," Price said. "It's staggering."

People can get free groceries at the center only every 90 days, so he said he understands how they also have to turn elsewhere.

"These are just people who don't have enough money top make ends meet," Price said. "And they can only come here four times a year."

Contact Torres at 242-3649 or jtorres@floridatoday.com.