North Side Food Pantry Goes High-Tech With Donations
PITTSBURGH (KDKA) - There are dozens of social service agencies and churches that operate food pantries around southwestern Pennsylvania.
All of them rely on donations to keep the doors open.
One food bank on the North Side is taking donations in a new high-tech way.
The North Side Food Pantry is the largest pantry this side of Philadelphia.
"The pantry, serving 1,000 families a month, is entirely run and donated by volunteers," Darlene Rushing said.
Despite being open only three mornings a week, it does a tremendous amount of good.
A recent suggestion from a neighbor gave them a big boost.
"What you need is a website and a way to buy food real easy and give people who want to help lots of different ways to do it and thus the Amazon Wish List," Jana Thompson said.
A recent fundraising campaign through Amazon netted them over 1,000 cans of tuna fish.
Here's how it works. On the pantry's website, when you click on the "donate food" link, you can now buy items via Amazon.
Those items are shipped directly to the North Side to fill their shelves.
"We choose things we think are reasonable in price and have free shipping. Toilet paper is a great one. That's something you can't buy with food stamps. We always need that," Thompson said.
"We are standing in front of the fruit section. There's only government apple sauce and dried cranberries on the shelf and I think I see three cans of lite peaches. So, our goal for January is to give every family one can of fruit," Rushing said.
Chances are the UPS truck will start delivering canned fruit in case quantities via Amazon any day now.
To donate food, visit their website here: http://www.northsidefoodpantry.org/donate-food/
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