Cedar Rapids AniMeals Video Transcript
Hi, I am Heidi with Cedar Rapids AniMeals. Cedar Rapids AniMeals is like a Meals on Wheels for pets. That is actually how AniMeals got started. Meals on Wheels volunteers noticed that their clients where sharing their meals with their pets. There is a need there. So, we started Cedar Rapids AniMeals to help feed those pets.
We have students from the Cedar Rapids Community School District come in and bag cat and dog food for us and proportion it out into Ziploc baggies and the students do that a few times a week each month until we’ve completed the bagging. It does take a while! After the bagging, we get a route prep team together and we all huddle in the middle and we go through all the routes. Each volunteer delivers to about five clients, five to ten clients, and we put together the routes. We call for what food we need and the volunteers bring it to us, we put it in their laundry basket and then the volunteer comes and picks it up and delivers it.
We get a lot of our food from Purina in Davenport. They are a huge supporter of Cedar Rapids AniMeals. Some years they are supplying our food for the entire year. So they are a wonderful partner.
Clients who want to participate in AniMeals can get a hold of us and fill out an application. They can be approved in three different ways. They can be referred by a social services agency, receive social security or receive disability.
Volunteers are needed on an on going basis to help us transport the food once we get it from Purina. We always need help putting together the route each month. We need help delivering for the routes to our clients. We currently have about thirty-two drivers a month. We create different routes and things here-and-there so drivers are always an important need.
Ways to donate to Cedar Rapids AniMeals would be to use one of our two drop-off locations, Petco and Affordable Plumbing & Remodeling on First Avenue. We can receive dog or cat food at those locations. Monetary donations can be donated through our website at cranimeals.com.
Cedar Rapids AniMeals is important for our community. It helps keep pets in their homes, their already loving homes and out of the shelters. It really eases the burden of our shelters. It also help provide really important service for our clients with companionship. It’s why we do what we do.
