Animal Welfare Professionals

I am writing to you from a small shelter in northern Minnesota. We are looking to get more involved in the community. A food bank is something the staff and I would like to to start for people in need at the shelter. 

Our question is we are not big enough to get tons of food donated. We do get 5-10 bags of donated food with either holes in the bag/ open/ close to expire a week .  We typically do not need to use this food in shelter as we have enough so far.  Would it be bad to say put it in gallon baggies so they are more closed bags etc. Some of the bags are destroyed so we would need to rebag some.   We are just going to have a small shelf that is open to the public to grab food in our door way if they need it. We could have 40-60 gallon bags at time roughly on our shelf.  We do not have enough staff to have to monitor who is taking what minus being able to restock the shelf. 

Does this scream do not do to anyone being its rebagging? Right now we do not have a food bank within 100 miles of our shelter. 

#food #CommunityPartnerships* #helpandadvice #petfood #donate 

#PetSupportServices*

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Marisa Schlauderaff
Veterinary Technician
Humane Society of the Lakes
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Hi Marisa,

We started a food bank due to Covid. We do keep a list of people who are receiving food from the food bank. We have them call when they need food and we make arrangements for them to pick up. In rare cases when a person is elderly or disabled and homebound we can make arrangements for a delivery.  I like your idea of a stocked shelf with self serve. We will sometimes rebag if we only have large bags available and it's a person with just a small dog. No sense giving 30 pounds of food to someone with a 8 pound dog.

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Renee Milner
Facebook page volunteer
Animal shelter alliance of Rhea
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Original Message:
Sent: 02-22-2023 06:21 AM
From: Marisa Schlauderaff
Subject: Starting a food bank

I am writing to you from a small shelter in northern Minnesota. We are looking to get more involved in the community. A food bank is something the staff and I would like to to start for people in need at the shelter. 

Our question is we are not big enough to get tons of food donated. We do get 5-10 bags of donated food with either holes in the bag/ open/ close to expire a week .  We typically do not need to use this food in shelter as we have enough so far.  Would it be bad to say put it in gallon baggies so they are more closed bags etc. Some of the bags are destroyed so we would need to rebag some.   We are just going to have a small shelf that is open to the public to grab food in our door way if they need it. We could have 40-60 gallon bags at time roughly on our shelf.  We do not have enough staff to have to monitor who is taking what minus being able to restock the shelf. 

Does this scream do not do to anyone being its rebagging? Right now we do not have a food bank within 100 miles of our shelter. 

#food #CommunityPartnerships* #helpandadvice #petfood #donate 

#PetSupportServices*

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Marisa Schlauderaff
Veterinary Technician
Humane Society of the Lakes
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