For animals living on the streets or in homeless camps, proper nutrition can be hard to come by. Now, there's a new food pantry just for pets.
Just about every day, Laurie Green with SAFPAW helps people and pets down on their luck.
"Bottled water, small thing of dog or cat food, fast food gift card so that people can get out of the heat would be a blessing. It really would," she said.
Sometimes she visits a trailer park. Other times it's a homeless camp. Now, she has added support. A new VCA Charities Pet Food Pantry has opened in Nashville.
"We have 33 of them around the country. This is number 33 for us," said Jennifer Scott with VCA Charities.
Together with Hill's Pet Nutrition and The Southern Alliance for People and Animal Welfare, or SAFPAW, they hope to help animals who can't easily access quality food.
"The pet food pantry will be at our resource center on Glancy Street in Goodlettsville which is in Davidson County. It's five minutes from Madison," she said.
As Nashville grows, so does the homeless and transient population. Both women say they want to keep people and their pets together.
The annual cost to provide nutritious pet food for each pantry location is about $5,000. Every year, the program helps more than 300,000 meals to animals in need.
