ProJo: R.I. nonprofit groups struggling: 'How do you go ... to donors and ask them to contribute?'

By Alex Kuffner | Journal Staff Writer

Posted: Mar 27, 2020 at 12:00 PM

Updated: Mar 27, 2020 at 7:50 PM

These social-services groups depend on fundraisers to sustain their mission, and fundraisers depend on crowds of people ...

PROVIDENCE — At a time when their services are needed most, food pantries, soup kitchens and homeless shelters across Rhode Island are being stretched thin as the coronavirus outbreak dries up their traditional sources of funding.

The Pawtucket Soup Kitchen is just one of the many nonprofits on the frontlines of the COVID-19 response that are struggling to keep up with a spike in demand. Housed in the basement of St. Joseph Church, the soup kitchen has over the last week increased the number of meals it serves from about 130 per day to more than 200.

It's doing so with fewer in-kind donations of food from restaurants and caterers, because those businesses have had to shut their doors or sharply curtail their operations. And the cadre of volunteers who staff the kitchen is dropping off because of the need for social distancing.

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