Pewaukee Food Pantry hits critical low, woman's donation drive takes off

PEWAUKEE, Wis. - The shelves at the Pewaukee Food Pantry were restocked after reaching a critically low level. One woman took it upon herself to organize a donation drive, and it took off.

"I don't think anyone liked the idea of kids potentially going hungry this summer," said Chris Krasovich, who organized the pantry drive.

"As the school year in Pewaukee begins to wind down, the number of kids needing meals goes up," explained Laura Bradin, the Pewaukee Food Pantry co-coordinator. "There's going to be more families coming. They need to be able to provide lunch that school once provided."

The Pewaukee Food Pantry is usually fully stocked at this time of year thanks to donations collected from a yearly drive with the Post Office. 

"The bags usually would be put out onto the mailboxes for all the households in Pewaukee," said Bradin.

However, after this year's drive, the pantry's shelves were left close to empty. 

"There were not a lot of bags put out, so the people did not know about it," Bradin said,

That's when Kasovich decided to help out. 

"If we could just set something up on Amazon, to make it really easy for people to donate," Krasovich said.

SIGN UP TODAY: Get daily headlines, breaking news emails from FOX6 News

Krasovich created a donation registry and shared it on Facebook, expecting to receive some donations. To her surprise, "boxes upon boxes [started] rolling into her house."

"We are probably talking close to 1,000 items," she said. "I just have piles and piles."

Krasovich and her friends began delivering those piles of donations to the Pewaukee Food Pantry. 

"It's everything we needed that was on our most needed list at the time," said Bradin. "This is just going to get us through the summer, if not longer."

"We live in a really fortunate community. Nobody should be going hungry," said Krasovich.

There are even more donations coming in from the registry, and the pantry is still accepting items.