BLACKFOOT — The Bingham County Senior Center’s Food Pantry is no more.

That much is true.

How it came to being shut down might depend on who you talk to. After talking with people on both sides of the senior center board’s 5-2 vote to close the pantry, there are several questions that remain.

The pantry started three years ago and until being shut down last month, it was serving between 100 and 120 seniors each week. To do so, pantry co-directors and senior center board members Jeannie Potter and Debbie Kluvers were picking up food donations daily and distributing the food to their fellow seniors. Together they put in about 55 hours combined each week.

On this point, the center’s new board chairman, Paul Loomis, emphatically agrees that they are dedicated volunteers who worked hard to serve the people.

At the start of the year, senior center board member Bennie Lilly and new board member Paul Jordan, who both have banking, tax and accounting backgrounds, expressed concerns about how the pantry was operating. Specifically, they found that the pantry was sometimes acting independent of the senior center while at other times was using the center’s non-profit status to save money. They didn’t want this inconsistency or confusion to jeopardize the senior center’s non-profit status or sales tax exemptions.

At about the same time, the center’s kitchen manager, Mindie Cameron, was notified that the pantry was part of the center’s health department food handling license and the health department had presented a list of unacceptable food handling procedures going on at the pantry that needed correcting.

According to the senior center’s executive director, Pamela Beus, all of the infractions were minor and could easily be remedied. Still, the news that the pantry was part of the senior center’s license was a surprise to the kitchen team — an unwelcome surprise since they hadn’t played any part in the pantry’s food preparations.

Loomis emphasized that the senior center board, including Potter and Kluvers, got the health department’s concerns the night before the January board meeting and there wasn’t much time to discuss the issues.

At the January meeting, both pressing issues — financial liability concerns and health department infractions — were addressed. Later Potter said she and Kluvers felt ambushed at the meeting; they heard accusations and demands instead of mutual solutions.

Many of the board’s members felt that the only solutions to the financial liability risk and health code infractions were for the pantry to get its own non-profit 501c3 status and health department food handling license.

Potter and Kluvers indicated that adding these tasks to their responsibilities was not something they were willing to do.

The discussion then shifted to whether the senior center needs a food pantry considering there are four other active food pantries in Blackfoot. Loomis said local seniors could use these other pantries “just as well,” indicating there wasn’t a crucial need for the senior center’s pantry.

When it was pointed out that the Community Dinner Table, Southeastern Idaho Community Action Agency, Bingham County Crisis Center and Community Council of Idaho pantries are not as readily accessible to the seniors who frequent the senior center, Loomis said that the Community Dinner Table has offered to bring food boxes to the seniors at the center every Wednesday.

With financial and health concerns pressing and no one willing to take on new significant time commitments for a service that is being provided elsewhere in the city, the senior center board voted 5-2 to close the pantry, with one member absent, one member abstaining and Potter and Kluvers voting nay.

After some thought, Kluvers resigned from the board the next day.

Two weeks later, a special senior center board meeting was called partly to address the emotional storm that resulted from the decision to close the center’s pantry.

At the meeting, the decision wasn’t being revisited, rather it was called to fill vacancies on the center’s board, share how the other Blackfoot pantries worked, explain about ongoing food donations and address other emotional storms whirling around the center.

It was noted that the senior center would continue to accept food donations from Ridley’s and Broulim’s supermarkets that had been donating to the center’s pantry.

The kitchen uses what they need from the donated food for the meals served at the center and for the Meals on Wheels dinners. The rest of the donated food is now set out on a free shelf at the center for anyone to take home — seniors or visitors.

The senior center board also said the center’s former pantry room is now being set up for use as the donation room where a variety of home and personal items are available to the seniors.

The room at the senior center that was formerly used for donations is now a multipurpose room that will be used for chair volleyball, board games and reading. The room is located near the center’s entrance and is a natural gathering space that will hopefully help the center feel larger and engaging.

A gentleman at one of last month’s board meetings suggested that posting the center’s mission statement could help everyone focus on how to better support the center and each other. He asked that the mission statement be read at the meeting and that it be more prominently posted.

The mission statement reads, “To enhance the quality of life for seniors and others in our community through nutrition, housing, education, and social opportunities.”

Last month’s decision to close the pantry was painful for some, but to others it was necessary to more fully fulfill the center’s mission in its limited space.

Perhaps it is true that “when one door closes, another opens.”