City Offers Free Hot Meals Program New Location, Philanthropist Says No Thanks

[Updated]   A city official says that a new venue has been found for a free hot meals giveaway program at the Villa-Parke Community Center after the city decided that location would no longer be made available, but the philanthropist who runs the program says he was neither informed nor consulted.

“I don’t know anything about a new location being found,” Robin Salzer, who operates the Pasadena United Food Bank with partner Walt Jackson, said in an email Friday morning. “No one has discussed a new location with us.”

“Since the city no longer welcomes the Pasadena Hot Meal Program at Villa Parke we will announce our new location next week,” Salzer wrote.

Mercy Santoro, head of the city’s Human Services & Recreation Dept., said in a memo yesterday that her department notified Salzer in late February that “the City needs the program to relocate because of the high volume of people who attend to receive the free hot meals is impacting the limited space and resources of the Villa-Parke Community Center.”

“We embrace his efforts, but the event needs a better space to continue to be successful,” Santoro said.

“We are, however, asking for the cooperation and understanding of Mr. Salzer and the United Pasadena Food Bank to relocate,” Santoro said in the memo. “The City is helping to reach out to several nearby locations and has found a site to continue to partner with Mr. Salzer in achieving his organization’s mission. Details have not yet been finalized.”

Salzer and Jackson said they only remember being told that April 10 was the last date they could serve meals at Villa-Parke, and that Santoro did not offer to help them relocate.

The pair allege that Santoro told them a crime was committed by a homeless person who was participating in their food giveaway program, and largely for that reason, the program could no longer operate at that community center.

“Walt and I were told to our faces that there was molestation close to a rape, a sexual assault from one of the people who was attending the meal program, a homeless person, on a 9-year-old boy in the bathroom,” Salzer said Wednesday.

Police say there is no record of such a crime occuring.

“City officials lied about a heinous crime and there should be repercussions for this,” Salzer said Friday. “Villa Parke is a Community Center open to all and now hungry members of the community are not welcome.”

The Villa-Parke United Pasadena Food Bank launched April 5, 2012 and marked an expansion of the organization’s successful operation at the Jackie Robinson Center.

The night it opened, a long line of prominent local leaders donned aprons and hairnets to serve meals to the guests, including Pasadena City Councilmembers Chris Holden and Victor Gordo, NAACP Pasadena Branch President Joe Brown, Roberta Martinez of Pasadena Latino Heritage, Manuel Contreras of the Mexican American Historical Society, former Villa-Parke Manager Serf Espinoza, Armenian Community Coalition President Chris Chahanian, Pastor Jean Burch, Pasadena Police Chief Philip Sanchez, Pasadena Fire Chief Calvin Wells, Pasadena City Manager Michael Beck and Mayor Bill Bogaard.

“Congratulations to United Pasadena Food Bank upon the opening of its hot meal program at Villa-Parke,” Bogaard said at the opening. “This serves an important community need and is a source of pride for Pasadena. Keep up the good work.”

City Public Information Officer William Boyer said that the situation with the United Pasadena Food Bank at Villa-Parke will not affect in any way the Food Bank’s other free hot meals distribution program at the Jackie Robinson Center.

“The great work that goes on there will continue,” Boyer said.