Finding the Kind on Davis Street
By Victoria Hansen
hansenv@findlay.edu
18 University of Findlay students woke up before 7:30 a.m. on Saturday, Oct. 25 for UF’s Mobile Food Pantry. Student volunteers loaded cars with juice, dry goods, and other foods to help prevent hunger in Findlay. In return, students received volunteer hours, 150 tickets for the Buford Center’s Grand Raffle, and the ability to serve others.
For freshman animal science major Keara Lantz, service takes a personal tone.
“I used to be in the same situation, and I still technically am with my family,” Lantz said. “My dad’s gotten a better job, but it’s still a struggle because we live out in the country on a property that we’re renting.”
For Nolan Nguyen in the master physician’s assistant program, it just seemed like the right thing to do.
“I used to volunteer a lot, and I want to get back into it,” Nguyen said. “It’s definitely a better use of my time than wasting it on social media, so I’ll take it.”
Lantz and Nguyen worked together at the first station cars pulled up to at the food pantry, which was responsible for various cold foods that stores had donated, such as milk, lunch meat, and more exotic fare.
“There’s caviar seaweed. It’s very strange,” Nguyen said.
“Someone’s eating good tonight,” Lantz said.
This station was the first stop for the food pantry, where clients got cold foods along with fresh fruits and vegetables loaded into their car. The next station had juice, peanut butter, and dried chickpeas.
The Mobile Food Pantry is a service of CHOPIN Hall, a Findlay charity that helps give out food to those in need.
“The Mobile Food Pantry is relatively new, and it came about because of COVID,” said Alex Parker, assistant director for campus and community engagement at UF. ”Before that, it was setting up shop within the Davis Street building, and people [clients of CHOPIN Hall] would come in and get a grocery cart and pick food from around the building.”
Since Parker started working at UF in 2023, the school has had one Mobile Food Bank per semester as well as one as an Orientation Service Project, for a total of seven Mobile Food Pantries during Parker’s time at UF.
“I want to see it go away. Mainly because this is a program that’s designed to help those less fortunate in our community and to uplift them and give them the things that they need. If we don’t have it, it means that there’s no need,” Parker said.
CHOPIN Hall’s next Mobile Food Pantry will be on Saturday, Nov. 8, at Gateway Church from 8:30 to 10 a.m. The next Mobile Food Pantry on UF’s campus will be on Jan. 24, 2026, to close out Martin Luther King Jr. week.
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