Putting together a full spread to celebrate Thanksgiving can be difficult for some families even without the loss of income many people have been experiencing because of the coronavirus pandemic.
To help meet the need, North Hills Community Outreach is holding a food drive dubbed Thanksgiving on Every Table through Nov. 9 to help families facing poverty, hardship and crisis.
“Based on the increase in people who have been coming to our food pantries this year, we expect that there are many more people in the community who will be struggling to provide for their families this Thanksgiving,” said Jeff Geissler, a spokesman for the North Hills charity.
He said the number of people who have needed help with food has increased by about 25% since the state-mandated shutdown went into effect in March.
“A lot of people are still out of work, and many of the people who weren’t let go have had their hours cut,” he said. “There are also people having problems working because they don’t have child care while their young children are at home attending school remotely.”
Last year, NHCO provided Thanksgiving dinners for nearly 500 families and about 1,000 used the organization’s food pantries.
Items needed to provide a complete Thanksgiving meal for a family include:
• Large boxes of stuffing and mashed potato mix
• Canned cranberry sauce
• Two, 16-ounce cans of vegetables
• Dessert mix
• Muffin mix
• Package of turkey gravy mix
• Napkins
• $20 grocery gift certificate to buy a turkey
• Canvas shopping bag
Thanksgiving donations can be dropped off between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. Mondays through Fridays at NHCO’s three locations:
Main office
1975 Ferguson Road
Allison Park, PA 15101
412-487-6316
Millvale
Millvale Community Center
416 Lincoln Ave., 2nd floor
Millvale, PA 15209
412-408-3830
North boroughs
Greenstone Methodist Church
939 California Ave.
Pittsburgh, PA 15202
412-307-0069
