Lower Cape Outreach Council At 40

ORLEANS – About 10 years ago, Averian Hughes needed help. Past due on her rent and out of work with a son and daughter to take care of, the Chatham resident and Jamaica native didn’t know where to turn.

Then someone pointed her in the direction of the Lower Cape Outreach Council.

“The rest is history,” she said.

Hughes’ story is not uncommon, especially at a time where the cost of housing, food and other goods and services continue to soar. But what started with an offer of rental assistance from the Orleans nonprofit evolved into other forms of help, she said. Today, she works two jobs. Her daughter is 14, and her son is a working high school graduate.

“I started going to the [council’s] pantry, I made some friends,” Hughes said. “They encourage me, give me Christmas stuff for my kids at Christmas, give me food. And I could get my food every week. It kind of changed my life a lot.”

The council has amassed a number of similar client stories in its 40-year history. Katie Wibby, the council’s CEO since 2022, said it’s why she and her dedicated crew of staff and volunteers show up to work each and every day.

“Those stories are what make the work so enjoyable, being able to have that impact on an individual and being able to hear the impact that it’s had on their life,” she said.

The nonprofit services residents in the towns of Harwich, Brewster, Orleans, Chatham, Eastham, Truro, Wellfleet and Provincetown. The council operates a food pantry in each town, with two in Orleans, including one in the basement of its offices on Brewster Cross Road. 

Lower Cape Outreach Council was started in 1980 by the social concerns committee of the Eastham United Methodist Church and the Nauset Family Advocates for Headstart. That same year, the council’s first pantry, dubbed the “Love Pantry,” opened its doors at the church, where it is still located.

The council incorporated itself as a nonprofit in 1984, and in 1987 it opened its second pantry in Orleans at the Orleans United Methodist Church. The council also began operating administratively out of its Brewster Cross Road location. 

Over the years the council continued to grow, opening more pantries across the Lower and Outer Cape and establishing key fundraising programs and events, namely its Gifts of Hope holiday fundraiser in 1992. In 1995, the council began a partnership with the Greater Boston Food Bank, which Wibby says plays a critical role in the council’s ability to meet the food demands of its clients’ annually. 

“They’re currently providing probably close to 70 percent of the food in our pantries,” she said.

But as the council grew and evolved over time, so too did the needs facing Lower and Outer Cape residents. Beyond food and help with bills and utilities, housing insecurity became a growing concern in the region, threatening to displace lifelong residents struggling to keep up with the higher cost of living. 

“Think about how much the Cape has changed over 40 years, and the affordability of it,” said Gerry Desautels, the council’s director of development. “The cost of living index for Barnstable County now is 131 percent, which is 31 percent above the national average. That’s significant.”

“We wanted to be more than a band aid,” said Larry Marsland, who led the council as CEO for 20 years from 2002 to 2022. “We were the most effective Band-Aid in town and were proud of the people we saved. But we weren’t going beyond essential, core issues.”

Under Marsland, the council began investing more in education, launching a jobs program that offered to cover people’s living expenses while they pursued classes and degrees to help advance their careers.

“The solution to the housing problem is being able to earn more than $10 or $15 an hour, because you are not going to be able to rent a house or buy a house,” he said. “You’re just not going to be able to. It’s just not possible, even with two hard-working people in the house.”

For Hughes, the various forms of assistance offered through the Lower Cape Outreach Council have been invaluable. But so too has the personal attention afforded to her by the council’s staff and volunteers, she said.

“I was stressed out, and I didn’t know what to do,” she recalled. “I was crying, and someone was there listening to my story.”

Andy O’Dell has been the council’s manager of client services since May 2022. Having a pantry in the council’s Brewster Cross Road offices allows for regular interaction between staff, volunteers and clients, he said. That in turn creates a sense of trust and security among clients utilizing the agency’s services.

O’Dell said it can be hard for people to step forward and seek out help, which makes the council’s ability to personalize its services all the more important.

“It can be challenging, but it takes time,” he said. “I think time and being gentle and understanding is the best way to move people in the direction of understanding what the help is and accepting it.”

Marsland added that clients are often paired with “advocates,” staff or volunteers who provide that personal support on a regular basis.

“Someone who keeps track of them, talks to them, encourages them and sees how they’re doing on agreed upon tasks and things,” he said.

Prior to joining the council, Marsland spent years working in New York as an actor, playwright and nightclub singer. He also was a partner in an advertising firm. 

When he moved to the Cape in 2002 to help care for his mother, he purchased his grandfather’s home in Chatham and began looking for work. He responded to an ad in a local paper seeking a development director for a local nonprofit.

“That’s what I wanted, a part-time job,” he said.

Little did he know that the part time job he signed up for would account for the next 20 years of his life. He advanced in his role at the council from development director to CEO, where he spearheaded fundraising efforts and recruited volunteers and members to serve on the council’s board of directors. 

“You had to become engaged or you had to get out, because there was too much that needed doing,” he said of the CEO job.

In 2022, Marsland felt that the time had come for him to step down and turn the council over to new leadership. Wibby, an Orleans resident and lawyer by trade, stepped into the role.

“I love my job,” she said.

Wibby formerly worked as an attorney with South Coastal Counties Legal Services, where she led the organization’s Elder Law Project. The council job offered an opportunity to bring her experience in client advocacy closer to home, she said.

“I spent a lot of time going to Falmouth and Bourne and outside of my immediate community, and I really wanted to have a bigger impact at home,” she said. “So here in Orleans, I get to not only serve underrepresented folks, whether it’s for food insecurity or financial assistance or clothing, but I also get to do it in my town. I’m able to give back to my community where I’m invested and my kids are growing up in.”

“I think Katie is a real find,” Marsland said. “I think they’re really lucky to have her.”

Asked about the council’s ability to grow and sustain itself for four decades, Wibby immediately credited the council’s estimated 200 volunteers. With a staff of just eight full-time employees, she said the council depends on its healthy volunteerism. That includes volunteers helping coordinate events such as the nonprofit’s annual Turkey Trot to those helping take in food and clothing at the pantries.

Those volunteer hours add up, said Desautels. Last year, he said, approximately 15,000 volunteer hours were logged with the council, the equivalent of 7.5 full-time employees.

“I credit the success of the organization to all the volunteers that have been with us, some as much as 20 years, and a board that’s just as dedicated to the mission,” Wibby said. “And of course all the donors that help us do the work everyday.”

Desautels underscored the importance of the council’s solid base of donors.

“What’s even more incredible for a nonprofit like ours is it’s not based on fee for service,” he said. “We’ve gone 40 years on donor support.”

Statistics provided by the council show the scope of its impact in the community over the past four decades. Since 1984, the council has distributed more than $13.8 million worth of food, $2.4 million worth of clothes and provided more than $13.6 million in financial assistance to people in need. 

But while those figures are significant, Wibby said the council isn’t resting on its laurels. With the median cost of a single family home in Orleans hovering near $1 million, the need in the community is as great today as ever, including for people who previously might not have needed the help.

“Even a six-digit income doesn’t necessarily support a lifestyle on the Cape, especially if you have kids and they’re in childcare and we’re paying what we’re paying,” she said.

Going forward, Wibby said the council will continue to work to make its services accessible to anyone who needs them, regardless of income.

“We want to encourage people to visit once a week if that’s what their situation demands. Because they could save that little bit of income that otherwise would have gone to groceries for whatever else they need,” she said.

As someone who has been in the position of needing help herself, Hughes encouraged anyone who is struggling or in need of assistance to ask for it. 

“I would tell them not to give up,” she said. “And you have to talk, because if you don’t talk people won’t know what’s going on in your life. You have to reach out to people like Andy. They’ll be here for you. They’re not going to turn their back on you.”