In less than a year Something Special Food Pantry, the all-volunteer food bank serving San Diego’s HIV and AIDS community, has seen its number of clients jump from 500 to over 700. The increase in clients comes at a time when donations are at an all time low and, as a result, the pantry had to close its doors for two days last week. Thanks to a large donation this past weekend the pantry is open again, but those supplies will only last so long.

“When the food drives start to dry up so does our pantry,” Jack Kisling, the chair of the Something Special Food Pantry board told the Gay and Lesbian Times. “Today our pantry looks very good and we are open again today because last weekend we bought food and one of our largest donors, Don Cicchetti, bought us a lot of food. By Thursday at noon the pantry shelves are going to look terrible again.”

Something Special has survived for over 10 years as an all-volunteer organization by holding food drives at local grocery stores. However, in the current economic climate and with fewer volunteers, times are tough for the agency.

“Two weekends ago we had a food drive,” Kisling said. “Nine people committed to showing up for the food drive. Only one showed up. Instead of what we usually get — 36 buckets of food — we got three buckets of food. That held us for half of one day. That’s why the pantry ended up being closed.”

In addition to a lack of volunteers out gathering food, in tough economic times people tend to donate less.

“The strangest, most interesting thing that we’ve noticed at the food drives are the people who avoid us and help us the least are the gay men from 18-35 years old,” Kisling said. “They actually avoid us. When they see us at the door they will do everything they can to walk around. I take it very offensively. The straight people help us more. We have an older woman who gives us a grocery cart full of food every time.”

Most frightening is that the same people who are avoiding the food drives also represent the fasting growing segment of the GLBT community with HIV and AIDS.

“Being the largest all-volunteer organization presents some problems,” long-time Something Special volunteer and board member Al Best said. “When you have a paid person or staff you can push a little harder than you would with just a volunteer organization. I’m hoping that a large organization can take us over. One that has more people than we have to oversee this thing and the food drives and so forth.”

New treatment therapies like the drug cocktails, which are commonly used now for people with HIV and AIDS, are also adding to the client load at Something Special.

“If people react well to the cocktail they move from being ambulatory, which is meal deliveries, to wanting food instead and then they move out of the program completely,” Kisling explained about the transition in services.

Unlike other HIV and AIDS agencies like Mama’s Kitchen or The Center, Something Special is funded completely through private funds. Currently board members are chipping in the money needed to pay for rent and utilities at their current facility.

“Too many clients have the idea that we are run by the city or we are run by the government and somebody mystical pays for this,” Kisling pointed out. “Nobody pays for this, this is a private operation. The city gives us $20,000 a year; the county gives us nothing. We get no Ryan White funds and all of our fundraising comes out of private pockets.”

The Something Special Food Pantry is currently in negotiations with another HIV and AIDS service agency, working towards a merger. Meanwhile, volunteers are needed for upcoming drives and are encouraged to call the volunteer hotline at (619) 459-4089 for more information.