SOUTH POINT — When it rains, it pours (into Michael’s Grace Place Community Pantry and Thrift Store in South Point).

Michael’s Grace Place Director Brenda Horan said in the six years since moving into the current building at 801 Solida Road, water leaks from rain has been an ongoing issue.

“It’s and old building and ever since the gutters got taken down it has leaked,” she said. “When it rains our building floods.”

Merchandise, which ranges from clothes and food to appliances and furniture, are placed on skids but oftentimes, she said, water still damages the items.

“The last time it rained we had just received a shipment of food we purchased from the Huntington (W.Va.) food bank,” she said. “It rained that night and it all got wet.”

Horan started the pantry eight years ago and before moving into her current building operated out of a rented house and then where the South Point First Church of the Nazarene is currently located. The leak problem, however, has Horan back on the search for new quarters.

“We were in this building for more than four years without paying rent,” she said. “Then a year and a half ago we started having to pay $300 a month. People want so much money to rent places it makes it tough.”

Horan is waiting to hear from a building owner in Burlington about a prospective property but will continue looking in the meantime.

Michael’s Grace Place receives donations from several local churches and serves an average of 400 families a month and 282 students per week.