The Lord’s Cupboard will be open at its new location today.

The pantry’s address is still the same. It’s still located at 127 N. 10th St. in the First United Methodist Church office building. But it has moved on up and is now located on the main floor. For the first time in its history. The Lord’s Cupboard is not in a basement.

This is an important move because it makes the site easily accessible to anyone who has a disability or just has trouble navigating a staircase. The stairs were hard on some of the volunteers as well clients. And since the pantry serves about 300 households a month, there was a lot of traffic up and down those stairs.

The move upstairs makes better service possible.

The new accommodations include a large main pantry room, several storage closets, a waiting room and handicapped-accessible bathrooms. The project was designed by Allers Associates Architects of Fort Dodge. Kolacia Construction, also of Fort Dodge, was the general contractor.

The move was completed just last weekend, when local Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts helped get all the food upstairs.

The move was made possible because the congregation of First United Methodist Church gave two-thirds of the building’s main floor to The Lord’s Cupboard.

Renovating that space to make it usable for the food pantry cost about $250,000. Fortunately, an anonymous donor promised to match up to $100,000 in donations to the project.

What resulted was a genuine improvement in service to our neighbors who need help putting food on the table.

Those who donated to the project, the congregation of First United Methodist Church, the staff and volunteers of The Lord’s Cupboard, the architects and the construction workers who made it happen deserve our thanks.