Cheney's 'interim' food bank director retires

It's a chilly Wednesday morning, Nov. 29, at the Cheney Food Bank, and volunteers John Matthews and Jerry Stewart have just finished loading 3–4 pre-bagged sacks of groceries into a cart for a young couple, who stand nearby on the other side of a short, small counter. The sacks contain many items, including dry and bakery goods, fresh fruit and vegetables.

The woman finishes signing a ledger on the counter, at which point Matthews retreats to a tall row of shelves on the right side of the counter that run back to near the rear of the middle of the room. Turning to the woman, he asks some questions.

Rice? Yes, is the response. Matthews puts a bag of white rice into a sack.

Peanut butter?

"It's Adams, and you have to stir it a bit," Matthews advises her. "Best there is."

She cautiously takes the peanut butter, but just to be safe, Stewart throws in a small jar of a generic brand as well.

Matthews walks to the other side of the room, between the counter and a perpendicular row of shelves housing the pre-bagged sacks of groceries, and opens the door to one of two large refrigerators. He pulls out a small package wrapped in cellophane as Stewart stands next to him waiting with an open plastic sack.

"Can I cook dinner for you tonight?" Matthews asks, extending the package. "Chicken with broccoli."

"Yes, please," the woman answers.

"I love to cook," Matthews replies.

The questions and answers continue as Matthews augments the couple's dry goods with frozen and cold items from the refrigerators and a re-purposed soda pop cooler nearby. Packaged salads, vegetables, milk (chocolate is desired as is regular fat-free, but not so much the coconut) and eventually a small, frozen turkey.

As Matthews and Stewart work, another young man, an Eastern Washington University senior from Portland, Ore. majoring in criminal justice, walks in and stands with his hands in his sweat pants pockets, waiting. He watches as the two men finish helping the couple, who leave with two grocery carts brimming with food.

It's a routine Matthews and Stewart know well, and one for which Matthews was recently honored for 25 years of work helping Cheney's hungry. The Chicago-native, retired U.S. Air Force bomber navigator began at the Food Bank in 1992, and served as its director from 1999 until his retirement in September, something he was honored with a community service award for at the Oct. 24 City Council meeting.

"I can think of no (other) citizen who has committed continuously, tirelessly to the community," Mayor Tom Trulove said in presenting Matthews the award. "Cheney is very proud of the work he's done."

Matthews first assignment out of flight school was with the 92nd Strategic Air Command Bomb Wing, flying missions in B-36s and B-52s out of Fairchild Air Force Base from 1954 – 1962. During that time he met and "married a Spokane girl" in 1959, bought a lot on Lake Coeur d'Alene and built a home.

After assignments in Glasgow, Mont, SAC headquarters in Omaha, Neb., a year in Vietnam and then back to Omaha, the couple retired to Coeur d'Alene in 1978. They eventually moved to Cheney to be closer to their sons attending Eastern Washington University.

In 1989, Matthews became treasurer of the organization that oversees the food bank and other charitable outreaches - Cheney's Community Service Council. He retains that role even after retiring as food bank director.

"I knew about the food bank because we paid all their bills," Matthews said.

Matthews began volunteering at the food bank, and then stepped in as director when the previous directors, Bill and Janette Stiffler, retired in 1999.

"I came in as an interim, hoping somebody else would step forward," he said. "It's been rewarding and its had a lot of volunteers.

It's also had a lot of customers. Matthews said between the food bank program and another one dedicated to helping senior citizens, the outreach sees over 1,200 visits a year, distributing an average of 45,000 pounds of food.

All that, and it's only open the first four Wednesdays of the month from 9 a.m. – noon.

One of the reasons Cheney's food bank is able to serve so many people with so much food so efficiently is because of a decision made 25 years ago to succumb to the rigors of paperwork and become affiliated with the federal food distribution program. It's a decision Matthews credits Stewart for spearheading when he served as director for a couple years in the early 1990s.

"It's more paperwork, but it's three times the amount of food," Matthews said.

It also helped that the federal and state governments increased their respective food programs funding in 2007 in response to the recession. The food bank doesn't see the money itself, but works through Second Harvest of Spokane, the organization that receives the funding and divvies it up among participating groups.

Matthews said this helps them purchase food at around 7 cents per pound.

Another reason Stewart and Matthews cited is the recent creation of "food rescue programs" at local Safeway and Yokes stores. The program frees up 2,000 pounds of food a month for the food bank of good, quality meats and dairy products that might otherwise go to waste.

The food items are near their expiration dates, Matthews explained, but are frozen. Thanks to two large, top-opening freezers in the rear of the food bank, those items can be stored safely for up to six months.

At an average distribution of 50 pounds per person, it's likely those items aren't in the freezers very long.

Back at the food bank last Wednesday, Matthews and Stewart begin serving the Eastern student, putting pre-made grocery sacks in a cart and offering a "holiday basket" complete with all the fixings for a turkey dinner.

"What's your sweet tooth?" Matthews asks. The young man says he doesn't have one, but after listening to a enticing list of dessert items, he happily agrees to a cheesecake that Matthews puts into the cart.

He leaves, but soon after, another young couple - Cheney residents and students at Spokane Community College - walk in. They're two of 14 people the food bank will serve on a day that, because it's the fifth Wednesday, it wasn't officially open.

Matthews and Stewart came in to do paperwork, but somehow forgot to lock the door.

"We'll take anybody who comes," Matthews said.

John McCallum can be reached at jmac@cheneyfreepress.com.