Pasadena's Foothill Unity Center providing boxes of food to those in need amid Coronavirus pandemic

PASADENA, Calif. (KABC) -- ABC7's virtual telethon helped many organizations across Southern California, like Foothill Unity Center in Pasadena, that has been aiding the San Gabriel Valley for four decades.

The center's group of volunteers came together to help a community in need amid the coronavirus emergency.

For Pasadena residents Elona Jackson and Aleks Mousaian, who pulled up into the parking lot of the facility, they each received a box of much-needed food.

Some of these locals are on fixed incomes, and many are not working because the coronavirus emergency.

"It's been pretty tough. I mean both of us not working. I'm really just paying rent and trying to survive. It can get tough," Mousaian said.

"Oh, it's bittersweet, but I'm hanging in there. I'm holding, we all are holding. It's very stressful, it's a stressful time," Jackson said.

One area resident picked up food for another family.

"Well this will help. You know just doing this for someone and it'll help them. It's instrumental, quite instrumental," the resident said.

The Foothill Unity Center will help out a few hundred people and families today with this free food, but supplies are tight, even grocery stores aren't donating as much.

The L.A. Food Bank, which helps stock the Foothill Unity Center's food giveaway, is one of the organizations that will benefit from those who donated to ABC7's telethon.

In addition to people driving up to get food, walk-ups are also welcomed, and the city of Pasadena's Dial-A-Ride, of which their drivers are coming to the location to pick up food for senior citizens, are encouraged to stop by.

"Because they are having to stay at home and are isolated, they pick up the food and take it to them. So it's a wonderful program and a wonderful modification so we can make this work," Betty McWilliams from the Foothill Unity Center said.

And as long as there's a need, the Pasadena-based center will do all it could to help feed those who need some help putting food on their tables.