Pgh Lesbian Correspondents

Update on the Closure of the Pittsburgh Pet Food Pantry

Pittsburgh has been responsive – 27 people have ordered items from our wishlists. It is a little hard to know the quantity until they arrive. But 27 is lovely and will help us be prepared for October.

I’ll admit I was hoping for an autumn avalanche, an outpouring so vast we could salvage September, That would ease my guilt over having to cancel. And that’s a selfish reason to hope for a windfall.

Once upon a time in the mid 90’s, I coordinate a human food pantry sustained by churches – this was rural Kentuky with 87 churches and no non-Christian communities. Catholics were exotic. We recruited 24 churches to do a monthly food drive – there was small congregations so we had to be reasonable – and it worked out well. I provided them with shopping lists each month based on inventory.

One day, everyone was all abuzz – I looked out of the window and saw a tractor trailer backing up to the door. It was from the local Mormon Church. An entire trailer worth of food. We had 50 pounds sacks of flour crammed into every corner. I had never seen a 50 pound sack of flour. Gallons of canned veggies. Cartons of cereal. A lot of lard.

I remember that feeling like it just happened today – they had this to offer their neighbors so they did. A lot of local folx didn’t trust them, but they showed up anyway without any conditions. The Calvary had arrived! Pun fully intended.

It was a lovely moment, a blessing even. The timing was perfect, the sentiment appreciated. And it happened because I was the first person to meet with the LDS Bishop and invite him into our fellowship. I asked and he came through for us even after being ignored by all of the other faith leaders for years.

And he committed to do it again when it was their month the following year.

Such a great memory.

Sigh.

But all I can is be transparent and keep asking for help, while working on the sustainability of the project. Beyond donating now, you can help us connect with community events – car shows, fall festivals, anything of that sort where we can bring Gertie. Even stuff the bus type events. And Gertie is available on her own to make public appearances.

To salvage September and get us through October (in case the Pistons in the Park drive isn’t successful) we’ll need at least 80 more bags of food of various sizes plus 200 cans of cat food. We have some dog food. This is minimum. Marie thinks we should give up on September and focus on October.

Divvying up the food can be a challenge. Each caretaker gets 12-16 pounds. Sometimes neighbors split a large bag or we count it for two months. Then we get lots of small 3.5 bags of food that we stack together. It is like a perpetual math problem. We never deliver open bags. Some pantries break down donations into ziploc bags, but we cannot do that realistically.

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