Helping the Many, Orange's Good Samaritan feeds the needs of those a paycheck away

Andrew Hollins, The Orange County Review, Sep 26, 2022

Nestled behind Main Street, just down the hill, there is a nondescript area that could easily be mistaken for a retail store’s loading bay. Like people and places who go to great lengths to help the desperate and the weary so often are, Good Samaritan Inc. wears a disguise. It looks like any other small business, much like the ones surrounding it.

Because just like any other business, Good Samaritan Inc. is not.

That’s because Good Samaritan is not a business at all. It’s a 501©(3) nonprofit organization founded by Tommie and Valencia Bailey, the pastor and first lady of House of God Tabernacle church, just next door. Tommie said that, while the church and Good Samaritan are close in every possible way, they’re completely separate entities on paper.

“The food pantry and thrift store are really my wife’s life work. It’s her baby,” Bailey said. “Her mother was always in the community helping people. If there was someone who needed food, she’d buy it or make it and bring it to them. If there was someone who needed clothes, she’d go to the store and buy it for them. She really cared about her community and wouldn’t let anyone go without.”

Inside the building, after a small greeting area, there is a space the size of your average retail store simply dedicated to the food pantry. Row after row of canned goods, coolers, baked goods, and more. It could pass for your average local food store, only without the linoleum floors. Or the price tags.

But Good Samaritan Inc. is unique, even among other food pantries. Instead of red tape, long lines and a one-size-fits-all approach, newcomers to Good Samaritan are greeted by Pastor Bailey and his staff of all volunteer members of his church and community, treated with individuality and immediately assessed for what their needs are and how they can be helped the most.

“We don’t look down our nose at people,” Bailey said. “I’ve had grown men come in and sit in that chair and cry because they couldn’t take care of their families. It’s hard. Most people out here are just one missed paycheck away from losing it all.”

All are welcome

Good Samaritan receives goods through cooperation with the Blue Ridge Area Food Bank and the government, as well as private donations and even purchasing goods directly for their patrons. Anything from the government requires a screening process to ensure that the federally donated goods are going to where they are needed, but as Pastor Bailey and many who work in the field has observed, these stringent criteria leave the inevitable situation where a person is in need but does not meet government requirements.

“We’ve had people come in who were not being helped because of one thing or another, and we’ve had to find a way to be able to help these people, too, especially because no one would,” Bailey said. “I’ve even gone over to the store and bought stuff for families myself. We all have.”

Because governments use data to determine where public funding for the needy is distributed, they are prone to looking at poverty as a number instead of a person. Orange County’s estimated poverty rate was 9.4% in 2021, and national averages typically hover around the 10% mark.

However, that doesn’t include the people who are living paycheck to paycheck, and are one personal tragedy or financial crisis away from not being able to feed their own children. All too often, it’s these people who are left without assistance, and are turned away from other places who base their qualifications solely on the government’s metrics.

“Here, we have things that can automatically qualify you for assistance, like SNAP or WIC, but they’re not how we base our determination,” Bailey said. “We try to help as many people as possible.”

It was this goal that inspired them to expand their services. Shortly after opening, the pastor and his wife opened the community closet section in the back, including three different rooms filled almost wall to wall with clothes of all sizes and styles, all with a sign on the door dedicated them to friends and family who have passed away, and a picture next to each sign of the room’s namesake.

“This was all my wife’s way of honoring her mother’s dedication to helping people. She’d get them whatever they needed and that’s what this is all about,” he said. “We’re small, and we don’t have many people here, but we try to help as many people as we can, with however much we can.

“Jesus didn’t take the many to serve the few. He took the few to serve the many.”

Feeding the flock

It’s not unusual for food banks to give out food. Typically, it’s a wait in the line, then you’re handed a box and offered a few things, whatever’s available, and then given a compassionate dismissal so they can help whoever’s next in line.

Good Samaritan does things a little differently. Following the intake process, newcomers—the pastor prefers the term “clients”—are next taken to the room where a few volunteers from among his flock take over.

Donna Norah, a Good Samaritan volunteer, explained that their process is simple.

“The clients come in, we give them a basket, put a box in it, and we tell them to fill it up with whatever they need,” she said. “And we let them pick it out themselves. We don’t just hand everybody the same thing.”

It’s not unusual for a food bank to also have a thrift shop or to help with clothing or household goods. Other organizations have often sought ways to be more encompassing with their charity. But at Good Samaritan, they sew their history of service to their community into the fabric of their work. Into its very walls.

But the next thing Mrs. Norah said exemplified the difference between Good Samaritan and most other food banks.

“Would you like something to eat?” she asked. “We have some chicken salad.”

It is not unusual for food banks to give out food. It’s unusual for them to offer to feed you.

“I’ve had grown men come in and sit in that chair and cry because they couldn’t take care of their families. It’s hard. Most people out here are just one missed paycheck away from losing it all."