Leger Fernández visits Gallup pantry, police, brings $320,000 training grant

A $320,000 federal grant for Gallup police landed alongside a tour of the Community Pantry, putting two of McKinley County’s most pressing daily needs, food access and public safety, in the same frame.

Teresa Leger Fernández visited the Gallup Community Pantry on April 1 with executive director Alice Perez, then moved on to the Gallup Police Department, where Chief Erin Toadlena-Pablo spoke with the congresswoman before the grant announcement. The money is listed in Leger Fernández’s funding records for virtual reality training technology for the City of Gallup Police Department at 451 Boardman Drive.

The pantry stop showed why local food demand remains so high. The Community Pantry says it serves families in McKinley County and Cibola County and partners with organizations serving three Pueblo Indian reservations. Its programs include Free Produce, TEFAP food boxes and Food for Kids for schoolchildren. The pantry also says 36% of McKinley County residents live below the poverty line, a number that helps explain why its shelves remain under pressure.

The scale of the need is stark. Feeding America’s Map the Meal Gap estimates that McKinley County had 16,320 food-insecure people in 2023, a 22.9% food insecurity rate and an annual food budget shortfall of $10,484,000. The New Mexico Department of Health says the USDA estimated more than 350,000 people, including over 100,000 children, were food insecure statewide in 2023.

The police grant points to a different but equally local need. Leger Fernández’s office said the virtual reality training is meant to help officers de-escalate situations, respond to complex scenarios and strengthen trust with the community. For Gallup, that means federal dollars aimed at preparing officers for encounters that can turn tense quickly, while avoiding the longer wait that often comes with larger infrastructure projects.

The same visit tied together two systems many households touch in a single week, a pantry that helps families get through the month and a police department that responds when something goes wrong. In McKinley County, where economic strain and public safety remain closely linked, the practical value of the visit was not the itinerary itself but the concrete support attached to it.