Love Center serves 258 Holmes County families in April, logs 336 visits

The Love Center served 258 Holmes County families in April and logged 336 visits, a sign that many households needed pantry help more than once as food and household costs kept pressing on tight budgets.

That gap between families and total visits matters. It shows the Millersburg pantry was not simply meeting one-time emergencies, but often helping the same households return during the month as they stretched food and household supplies from one week to the next. In Holmes County, where many families live close to the margin, repeated pantry use is part of how the local safety net holds together.

The April tally also puts a sharper question in view: which needs are rising fastest, and whether the Love Center is seeing more first-time families, more working households, or more people who already rely on its shelves. The numbers alone do not answer that, but they show the strain clearly.

The pantry said food from the Akron-Canton Regional Foodbank accounted for 19,584 pounds in April. Another 11,712 pounds came from businesses, churches and individuals in the community, giving the center more than 31,000 pounds of food from those two sources alone. Volunteer labor was just as important. The Love Center logged 767 volunteer hours during the month, hours that went into sorting donations, handling distribution and keeping the pantry running day to day.

The Love Center says it has been assisting families with emergency food supplies since 1986 and now helps more than 700 Holmes County families each year. It serves residents who cannot afford basic food items and operates as a member agency of the Akron-Canton Regional Foodbank, which provides food and other essential products to pantries, shelters and other hunger-relief programs near Akron. Feeding America says that food bank was formed in 1982 by community leaders committed to emergency food relief.

The pantry is located at 1291 Massillon Road, Suite A, in Millersburg, Ohio 44654, and can be reached at 330-674-2504. Pantry hours are Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 1 to 4:30 p.m.

Director Edgar Raber said local donations had remained steady and client numbers had not dropped significantly, even as the pantry continued to track broader pressure on family budgets. For Holmes County, April’s numbers show a long-running local service still carrying real weight in the middle of everyday costs.