Thursday, October 22, 2026
At the Long Island Cares food pantry in Freeport, volunteers are essential.
They greet clients, organize food, help with paperwork and keep the pantry functioning as federal food programs face cuts and the community need remains high. April is National Volunteer Month, when recognizing their contributions is more important than ever.
Reyna Felix, the program coordinator at the pantry, said that the facility can’t function without volunteers.
“Nothing would be possible without them,” she said. “My volunteers are my eyes inside the pantry. And when I find that, it’s like I can be focused on doing my job, and I know for sure that the pantry is in a good hands.
“Franklin, Roseanne and now my intern, Raina,” Felix added. “They’ve been such a blessing for the pantry because they always learn so fast, the process, and they also improve every day. They give me ideas.
They suggest anything, any change, anything that we need to update.” Raina Joseph, a Baldwin resident and a Stony Brook University student on the pre-nursing track, said she found out about the pantry through a school email listing volunteer opportunities.
“I heard about the volunteer work through Stony Brook,” she said. “And then they said that I can, you know, volunteer at the pantry, there’s SNAP benefits and security. And I thought it was just a great idea to see how we can help the community in other ways.”
Joseph now handles intake forms, shelves inventory, and helps keep the pantry orderly.
The experience, she said, has changed her perspective.
“I think that all help comes (in) different shapes and forms. No matter what you’re doing, it’s always worth it just because, you know, clients only come once a month. But that little three- or four-day help they have — it’s worth it. So I think that’s what matters, even though it’s temporary, but seeing a smile on their faces, knowing that they have some type of help from the community, means a lot.”
Roseann Kozarsky, a retired teacher’s aide from East Meadow, started volunteering after leaving her position with Nassau BOCES.
“When I retired, I kind of knew I wanted to do something with my time,” she said. “Volunteering has always been something I’ve done since my kids started school, and they’re now grown, they’re adults. I’ve always volunteered PTA at their religious school, and I just felt like that would be a good thing to do.”
Kozarsky now works on Tuesdays, when the pantry is open to veterans.
“They come every week, so you really get to know them,” she said. “When I walk in, they’re almost like, you know, friends now. Everybody says hello, and you go in and you call in one person at a time, and you help them pick out their shopping that they want to do for that week.” “It’s sad,” she added, “when you look at our veterans and they say that they don’t have enough money to come to eat, that they need to supplement their food with the pantry. It’s sad. It shouldn’t be.”
Franklin Karp, of Long Beach, is a retired executive of electronics companies Harvey Electronics and Audio Video Systems Inc. who started volunteering in January 2024.
“I was pushed into retirement at the age of 68, and for a while I found myself (having) not a lot of direction, other than reading the newspaper every day,” Karp said. “So I started looking around, and I had been familiar with Long Island Cares. So I said, let me give this a try. “It became a wonderful thing for me, and I hope a wonderful thing for the people I get to help,” he added. “And it kind of like reordered my life.”
Karp now volunteers twice a week, and has gotten to know many pantry clients personally. “You see those people four times a month, you get to know even more about them, and they get to know a little about you,” he said. “It’s really eye-opening.”
Felix said that recent state and federal cuts to the Hunger Prevention and Nutrition Assistance Program and the Emergency Food Assistance Program have had a major impact.
“They cut most of our funds, and we will be the first ones that experience that,” she said. “(The volunteers) feel very sad, because they’re the ones to help the clients. And sometimes they can’t even answer when the clients say, Oh, why you don’t have this, why you don’t have that, what’s going on? And, you know, it’s kind of tough. It’s a challenge for everybody.”
Still, the pantry continues to operate — thanks to the volunteers who keep showing up. “Get over your fears, get over your inhibitions,” Karp said when asked what he would say to someone debating whether to get involved in volunteering.
“You’ll find it to be one of the most rewarding things that you can do in your life.” “It just makes you more aware, also, of what’s going on in your own neighborhood, your own community,” Kozarsky said. “That little bit of help,” Joseph said, “comes a long way.”
