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There are too few resources in GBLS to help everyone who seeks assistance. Cases are <br />thus assessed on the merits, which include whether they fit in with priority topics and whether <br />clients have documents that will support their cases. Most referrals for Lexington come from the <br />Senior Center and the Minuteman Senior Services Agency, a state agency for the elderly. <br />18.Other Services. There are a few services available to Lexington residents and transits <br />that have not been described in this inventory. They include the Waltham Clothing Exchange, <br />the Briston Lodge for Men, the Edinburg Center and Eliot Community Mental Health Center <br />headquartered in Concord. Edinburg and Eliot were covered in full in our 2002 Committee report <br />on the availability of mental health services. We revisited these agencies for this project and <br />again learned that very few Lexington residents make use of either agency. <br />III. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS <br />1.We learned from this project that somewhere between 150 and 300 Lexington residents <br />and transients draw annually on approximately twenty agency-based services of assistance. The <br />most widespread need is for food supplies and there are both individuals and households that <br />rotate around the ring of available food programs and food pantries in the area. These include the <br />Lexington Pantry which offers bags of staples but no lunch or dinner programs, and the Bedford <br />free dinners and Pantry, and eve pantries and programs in Waltham. Bags of supplies are limited <br />to each recipient weekly but by rotating a person could obtain free supplies that would stretch to <br />cover two meals a day every day. Need and demand for free food is rising significantly, <br />according to workers in most of the agencies. <br />2. There is also substantial demand for housing. Short-term persons in need are sheltered <br />at the Battle Green Inn, which hosts about 30 individuals and families nightly for periods of three <br />lA <br />