We will do everything we can for our clients.”

Tap-In President Laurie Ward

Need continues to climb

Following is a closer look at the total number of client visits experienced by Tap-In over the past few years:

• 2022-23: 5,672 visits

• 2023-24: 7,144 visits

• 2024-25: 7,900 visits (estimated)

Note: Tap-In’s fiscal year runs from April 1 to March 31. The local non-profit served about 1,450 unique households this year, about 29 percent of the people served are children.

Helping hands

Tap-In President Laurie Ward, in her words: “We get a tremendous amount of help from the community. Shaws (Barrington) works closely with us on food rescue and their nourishing neighbors program. We buy our produce from Farm Fresh but that is supplemented by donations from McCoy Farms and Barrington Farm School in the growing season. Vienna Bakery drops off bread weekly and we're working with Plant City on food rescue as well. We have so many generous donors and grantors. On top of all that, we have so many food drives. Those are organized by local schools and houses of worship, businesses, mail carriers and a lot of individuals. The mail carriers food drive is coming up on May 10th. It is our largest single food drive, bringing in about 5,000 pounds of food in a single day.”

The basement of the Peck Center building was a swirl of activity. 

At about 11:45 a.m. on Friday, March 14, Tap-In headquarters was packed with volunteers helping clients fill shopping carts with a wide range of necessities: Sheets, towels, fruits and vegetables, bags of frozen meats, boxes of cereal, loaves of bread, and more. 

The local non-profit has been very busy this year, and officials expect that the recent federal budget cuts to supplemental food support programs and food banks will only make it busier. 

Laurie Ward, president of the all-volunteer organization, said Tap-In, which assists people in Barrington, East Providence, Bristol and Warren, has experienced a significant increase in client visits. Ward said there could be even more people looking for assistance as federal budget cuts set in. 

“What’s on the table is the 25 percent cut to SNAP,” Ward said, referring to the supplemental food program. “In Rhode Island, we have 144,000 people taking advantage of SNAP. From our perspective, that’s a huge deal. We don’t know exactly what that will mean for us. We know when people are losing SNAP benefits they’re going to come use food pantries more. 

“After Covid, the SNAP benefits went down and we saw a huge increase, like a 25 percent increase. What we’re expecting from the SNAP cuts is that it’s going to mean more people need us, and more people need us more often.”

Ward said Tap-In officials expect the federal cuts to impact the local food pantry in two specific ways.

“The food bank is our biggest donor. I’m estimating that this year they’ll end up giving us around 150,000 pounds of food. That’s a lot. So, whatever happens to the food bank — and they’re very much dependent on federal funding — is going to affect us, in terms of what they give us. So that’s one way we’re affected,” Ward said. “The other way we’ll be affected is through our clients, based on happens to their SNAP benefits. So we’ll see it in both those ways.”

Focused on food

Ward and past Tap-In president Shauna Hyde shared a tour of the local food pantry on Friday.

Shelves were filled with canned goods and other nonperishable foods. A row of freezers and coolers lined the back wall — inside was frozen meats, dairy products and other items. Ward said Tap-In has been able to continually offer healthy food options to its clients, even distributing eggs when some stores were unable to do so. 

Ward said about 97 to 98 percent of the client visits are for food. While Tap-In also provides diapers, socks and underwear, home goods, sheets, towels, cleaning supplies, and toiletries, the priority for most clients is food. 

“They really do depend on the cleaning supplies and toiletries too, but the primary reason for the visit is for food,” Ward said.

“We’ve thought about this a lot. One thing for us to remember is, our priority is food. We have other programs that we do that help people. I think if need-be, we would pull resources from other programs and stay focused on food. We want to keep the levels we have, healthy options. We have great produce. That’s really important to people. We get eggs, that’s really important to people.”

Key to maintaining Tap-In’s mission is an impressive network of support. 

“We live in a community that provides tremendous support, in every way, through generous donations,” Ward said. “If I look at the list, every school is involved. They do food drives. They do grocery drives. It might be somebody coming in bringing 10 canned goods. It might be kids at Nayatt doing a drive.”

Hyde mentioned the annual polar plunge event at Barrington Beach held by the business association and the upcoming Easter egg hunt host by the local Lions Club. 

“The Barrington Business and Community Association does a ton for us. They do events like that. The mail carriers are doing a food drive. The mail carrier food drive is the biggest single-day food drive across the country. That’s in May,” Ward said. “And then we get financial donations. We also write grants. It’s just an incredibly generous community.”

Despite the support, Tap-In officials are anticipating some tough times ahead. 

“Absolutely it will be strained,” Ward said, adding “We’re going to be here. We’re going to keep doing what we’re doing. And we’re going to look at our clients’ needs, and food is such a basic need for people, and we’re going to stay focused on that. And we’re going to do everything we can to providing these options, healthy options… Are we worried about that? Absolutely. Are we worried how we’re going to do it? Yeah.”

Ward said the Barrington Shaw’s Supermarket has been a consistent supporter of Tap-In. 

“We do a lot of food rescue with Shaw’s. They are really supportive of us,” she said. Just last week, officials from Shaw’s dropped off a large donation that was raised through its Nourishing Neighbors program.

“We just get support in all kinds of ways. That doesn’t mean it’s easy … and I feel for other food pantries across the state that maybe don’t have the support,” Ward said. “It’s really worrisome and it’s not to say that we can make all that up, we’re just going to do everything we can to stay really focused on food. We will do everything we can for our clients.”