Leopards community invited to ‘Stuff the Bus’
The Bag Brigade will collect food donations before Friday night’s BVA football game.
The Bag Brigade, which collects food for Belle Vernon Area students, will be accepting donations at a Stuff the Bus event before Friday’s football game against Thomas Jefferson.
A bus will be parked at the main entrance of the stadium, and donations can be dropped off from 5 to 7 p.m.
They will accept all single-serve food items, but the Bag Brigade is in the most need of Spaghetti O’s, boxed drinks, pudding cups, oatmeal packets, popcorn and fruit cups.
The Bag Brigade provides food packages to BVA students in need, especially during the weekends.
The nonprofit was created by Kathy Kelly and Ashlee Eisengart, and it’s based out of The Hub in Rostraver Township, where they occasionally host donation events or have local organizations come in and help out.
“I think it’s important just to say thank you ahead of time for all the 00083708
support that we get from the school, from the organizations within the school, and for the community who helps us on a weekly basis,” Kelly said. “We can’t be successful without two things. We can’t be successful without God and we can’t be successful without this being a community outreach where the community is helping the bag brigade to reach these kids.”
This will be the fifth year for the Stuff the Bus event, and Kelly was inspired after seeing other schools doing a similar program. Since then, Kelly and Eisengart have been hosting the event every year, with help from Kristie Bowman.
It was originally hosted at The Hub, but they started doing it before BVA football games, where they’re more visible to the community.
The Bag Brigade gets help from schools in the district. Rostraver Elementary School is collecting peanut butter and cheese cracker packs to distribute to students.
The RES student who brings in the most donations will win a prize from BeeGraphix. Kelly said that help from students and their organizations has become an essential part of their event every year.
“We have the Marion Elementary doing ramen noodles for us, and then Rostraver Elementary is doing the peanut butter crackers for us,” Kelly said. “And then we also have a lot of the different organizations within the school that are helping out, whether it be the football team, the cheerleaders, we have cross country helping us. We have a whole bunch of different organizations.”
Kelly said monetary or food donations can also be dropped off at The Hub, located at 1181 Fells Church Road. It’s open every day from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Donations are also accepted from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m. every Tuesday, which is when the food is packed. They can also be taken to BeeGraphix at 905 Broad Ave. in North Belle Vernon.
Kelly said families interested in receiving food can talk to their school’s guidance counselor, reach out to the Bag Brigade at bagbrigadegac@ gmail.com or contact them through their Bag Brigade Facebook page.
