{"id":50425,"date":"2025-11-17T22:14:11","date_gmt":"2025-11-17T22:14:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/50425\/"},"modified":"2025-11-17T22:14:11","modified_gmt":"2025-11-17T22:14:11","slug":"residents-in-south-st-pete-experience-difficulty-accessing-grocery-stores","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/50425\/","title":{"rendered":"Residents in South St. Pete experience difficulty accessing grocery stores"},"content":{"rendered":"

PINELLAS COUNTY, Fla. \u2014 People in South St. Pete are asking for more access to food. The area is considered a food desert, as grocery stores are few and far between.<\/p>\n

But one organization is working to change that.<\/p>\n

“Depressing. I feel sorry for a lot of them that can’t drive,” said Vergie Reynolds who lives in St. Pete.<\/p>\n

Reynolds used to shop at this Save-A-Lot in Gulfport. It was the closest grocery store to her, until it closed back in September.<\/p>\n

“It’s not surprising that the stores are coming in the area\u2026we expect it to be hard times,” said Reynolds.<\/p>\n

She lives in St. Pete and said she now has to travel farther to access food. She said other people also struggle.<\/p>\n

“I have seen quite a few mature order people like me saying ‘what are we going to do? What are we going to do? We don’t have a car, we can’t drive,’ you know,” said Reynolds.<\/p>\n

J. King said he knows many people who don’t have cars and have to take the bus to get to the nearest grocery store.<\/p>\n

“In spite of the fact that everything is getting expensive, it’s compounded because you also have travel expenses that are going to be incorporated into every venture,” said King.<\/p>\n

The One Community Grocery Co-Op has been working to provide local grocery store options to residents in South St. Pete for years. Last Thursday, a city council committee voted against giving the co-op a $50,000 capacity-building grant.<\/p>\n

\"One<\/p>\n

WFTS<\/p>\n

Committee members state there currently isn’t enough funding for the project.<\/p>\n

“It hurts, but we are still moving forward, we are still making it happen,” said Erica Hardison.<\/p>\n

Erica Hardison with the One Community Grocery Co-Op said, despite the lack of funding, the organization is still trying to help residents.<\/p>\n

“We are going and doing the produce pop-ups, doing our events, building awareness,” said Hardison.<\/p>\n

City committee members said they will discuss funding options for the project sometime in January.<\/p>\n

“Maybe somebody else will open up\u2026I hope so\u2026especially talking to a lot of them who can’t drive,” said Reynolds.<\/p>\n

Share Your Story with Casey

Casey Albritton is dedicated to telling your stories throughout Pinellas County. From South St. Petersburg to Tarpon Springs, she\u2019s there to share the triumphs and struggles of the community she calls home. So, let Casey know about the stories that matter to you.
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Florida beekeeper loses livelihood after neighbor has 20 beehives removed from his property<\/p>\n

An 84-year-old Citrus County beekeeper is fighting to recover 20 active beehives that were taken from his property months ago, leaving him without his main source of income and removing up to 2 million bees from the local ecosystem.<\/p>\n

Florida beekeeper loses livelihood after neighbor has 20 beehives removed from his property<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PINELLAS COUNTY, Fla. \u2014 People in South St. Pete are asking for more access to food. The area…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":50426,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[205,832,575,11271,32030,596,32031,202,204,203,199,201,200,3670,208],"class_list":["post-50425","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-abc-action-news","tag-city-council","tag-food","tag-groceries","tag-one-community-grocery-co-op","tag-pinellas-county","tag-south-st-pete","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news","tag-tampa-bay-local-news","tag-wfts"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50425"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50425\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/50426"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}