Striking SAG-AFTRA members volunteer at food pantry, help fellow Hollywood actors

LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- SAG-AFTRA volunteers helped host and staff a food pantry Saturday morning in the Miracle Mile neighborhood of Los Angeles for fellow union members impacted by the ongoing Hollywood strike.

As Hollywood productions are on halt, some members of SAG-AFTRA are finding it harder to make ends meet.

Union members say the food pantry held Saturday was a big help.

"The budget is incredibly tight, and we do feel the squeeze," actress Monika Beal said. "So having access to this will be great - we have breakfast for another week."

SAG-AFTRA partnered with the AIDS Healthcare Foundation's Food for Health program to make the new resource available. At the first event, organizers prepared to help feed about 200 families. They provided fresh vegetables, fruits, milk and eggs.

"We work so we can eat, and we eat so we can work. Unfortunately, there's a lot of people that cannot afford to buy groceries," said Carlos Marroquin, the national director of Food for Health. "This is the real life that people live in right now, and the message today is that hang in there because we are with you."

Folks from the SAG-AFTRA community like Christian Wilkins are benefitting from the pantry, but also volunteering to help their peers as the strike continues.

"I am Australian. I moved here a week before this strike happened," Wilkins said. "Not the best timing, but it has been amazing to see how the community has really rallied around each other."

The pantry will open every week while the unions are on strike.