Seven years after its inauguration, the Golden Grizzlies’ Food Pantry moved locations after a flood over the summer. With no available garments and backstock food on the shelves, the pantry’s team said they suffered no major losses.
On July 28, the drains at the Oakland Center’s (OC) basement gushed with trouble. This time, the flooding forced the pantry into the Lake Michigan room while the Office for Student Involvement (OSI) went to Lake Superior room.
“There is a drain outside of the old pantry and I saw some footage of when the flooding was happening,” Leah Mosier, a bachelor’s of social work intern at the pantry, said. “It was coming all up through the drain and then just going through the basement floor. It went into the pantry and into the OSI, it all happened pretty quickly.”
As the water rose on the south end of the basement, both offices had to move equipment and items on top of the shelves to avoid material losses while the OC coordinated to close down the basement.
“The lower level has experienced water entering the lower level regularly since the renovation and expansion were completed in Fall 2018,” Chris Reed, the OC’s executive director, said. “The amount of rainfall in this case caused water to come up through storm drain cleanouts and cracks in the floor throughout the lower level.”
The lower level of the building experienced a similar flood in August 2023. Reed explained that the clean-out work of that instance impacted the level of water witnessed this year.
“‘Ground zero,’ or those areas from the Habitat towards the Office for Student Involvement, had approximately one inch of standing water,” Reed said. “Since the rain fell during the afternoon, many staff members were quick to respond to limit the impact, and Belfor was able to respond and send a team the same day to start the clean-up.”
The timing was chaotic, Mosier explained, as both the OSI and the pantry had training the days following the flood, coupled with the task of moving the entire office to the new rooms.
“If you’ve noticed, we don’t have any clothes on the racks, but as far as we know, they’re currently being dry cleaned,” Mosier said. “We don’t know a timeline of when we’re going to get them back, but as far as we know, they’re being sanitized from the flood, and there weren’t any super major losses.”
The open room at the new pantry stands in contrast with the prior office, lined with shelves and a separate conference room. There is no designated space for garments or backstock.
“Now, pretty much most of what we have is on the shelves; there’s a small exception with a little bit of overflow,” Mosier said. “It means you might not be able to keep the shelves as consistently full as they used to be. So that’s something we’re currently navigating.”
In the meantime, modifications have been done to the drywall and insulation, which absorb water — Reed explained. Much of the carpet and vinyl tile in the damaged areas was replaced with epoxy flooring, which is easier to clean.
“The University is currently in the process of finding a permanent solution to the issues that are causing these ‘water intrusion events,’” Reed said. “While there is not a 100% fool-proof solution, our hope is to reduce the number of times water enters the lower level, and even in cases such as this past July that the impact is far less and quicker to restore.”
The OSI and Golden Grizzlies’ Food Pantry are expecting to move into the former gear shop across from where they are located now. Without a definitive date for their relocation, the best way to support the pantry is through donations and word of mouth.
“If you have peers who are having a difficult time, a lot of students, because we’ve been in the basement, don’t necessarily know we exist,” Mosier said. “So the more you can spread the word to students, to know where the resource is for them, the better.”
