GRANGEVILLE — After years of serving food to people in need from a church kitchen, a garage, a storage shed and a dilapidated century-old house, the Camas Prairie Food Bank finally has moved into a home that merits its charitable work.

The all-volunteer nonprofit food bank recently opened a brand new 5,900-square-foot building with ample refrigeration and storage space, a comfortable lobby, an office, a cooking demonstration room and a service area to meet all of its present needs and allow for possible future growth.

“This was not my idea,” said Ken Lefsaker, who started helping out at the food bank about three years ago after retiring and ended up last year as its director. “I just kind of got committed. I didn’t know we were going to be going into a building program.”

The food bank organizers had been operating on a shoestring budget since the 1990s, collecting donations and handing out food baskets wherever they were needed.

At the time, it was one of two food banks in Grangeville. In 2014, the president of the Idaho County Food Bank, which was not formally connected to the county government, was convicted of theft for using the organization’s debit card to make unauthorized personal purchases. That food bank closed, leaving the Camas Prairie Food Bank to handle the heft of food basket handouts in the county.

The old building where the food bank was located was inadequate in many ways. Lefsaker said the roof leaked, the electrical system was sketchy, the floors and other parts of the structure were rotting, the plumbing was bad and the women who ran the operation knew they needed something better.

So they began to save. Lefsaker said when he took over as director, the food bank had already squirreled away a sizable seed account for the future.

“I guess (the organizers) must have pinched every penny they could, because they had quite a jag in the bank,” Lefsaker said.

They also began seeking small grants and were able to pay off the land where the old building was and the new one now sits.

“And, by golly, it went pretty well,” Lefsaker said. Last December, the Lewis Clark Valley Healthcare Foundation awarded the food bank $75,000, and that was the turning point.

“We said, `You know what? We’re going to get started.’ We just prayed about it, and everybody said it feels like God wants us to do this.”

Construction started last winter. Carol Schmidt, one of the original organizers of the food bank, said she believes divine providence was involved.

“You know, I just glorify God because he knew what was going on, and he has done this whole thing. He has helped the whole way. We couldn’t do it without him,” Schmidt said. “I get teary-eyed every time I think about it, because it’s just been a humbling experience.”

Lefsaker drew on his professional connections to sign on Jerry Schwartz, of Grangeville, as the general contractor and acquired building materials at cost from Grangeville Builders Supply. Schwartz, Lefsaker said, donated his own time and charged only for the labor of his crew. Idaho Forest Group donated all the framing lumber for the building. A recent gift of $8,000 from the Grangeville Community Foundation paid for a flank of new walk-in freezers. While the finished project is valued at about $385,000, Lefsaker said he thinks in the end it will cost them about $44,000.

“We have no debt,” he said. “I owe Jerry (Schwartz) a chunk. … He said, ‘I’m not going to bill you until you get up and running, because I want to see this thing done.’ And two weeks ago I said, ‘You really ought to give me a bill. I think we got the money,’ and I never heard back.”

The food bank currently serves about 350 to 400 people a month — a number that has been growing over the years. Besides local donations of food and money, it also is supplied by the Idaho Food Bank in Lewiston and receives federal food commodities.

Most people receive food baskets once a month, but Lefsaker said people who are homeless and those who have emergencies can get donations more often than that.

“And we load them up pretty good,” he said. “We give out a couple cardboard boxes (of food worth) about $100 of groceries.”

Eventually the Grangeville food bank may become a central distributing hub for other community food banks in the county, although no definite plans have been made. Lefsaker said it is also hoped that cooking classes can be offered at the site for people who need help preparing the foodstuffs they receive.

People who receive food donations are not required to meet any income threshold or other qualification. And even though several of the board members look at their work there as part of their personal religious calling, folks who come for help are not asked any religious or political questions or subjected to proselytizing.

“It’s a trust system,” Lefsaker said. “We never turn anybody away. Sometimes people ask you to pray for them, but we don’t proselytize and we don’t have requirements of any kind. Just come in.”

The Camas Prairie Food Bank is located at 411 E. North Street in Grangeville and is open to the public from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Tuesdays and Fridays. It can be reached through Facebook or at (208) 507-2365.

Hedberg may be contacted at kathyhedberg@gmail.com or (208) 983-2326.