Oglesby native makes appearance on Kelly Clarkson Show to talk about helping a food pantry

Oglesby native Erin Shields saw lines of people winding from the food pantry in her Queens neighborhood and wanted to help.

She and her husband David are traveling musicians — so they decided they could host some virtual concerts on Zoom to raise money for the Sunnyside Queens food pantry at the Mosaic Community Center.

The food pantry was featured in a good neighbor segment that aired Tuesday on the Kelly Clarkson Show. The clip can be found on the Kelly Clarkson Show’s Facebook page.

“When live music went away with COVID, so did our livelihood, which was pretty devastating,” Shields said. “We have a lot of time on our hands so we’ve gone for long walks and we saw all these long lines of people waiting for something, and we didn’t know what. We found out that they were actually waiting for food.

“We thought this is our neighborhood, there’s got to be something we can do to help.”

Shields said she met Sofia Moncayo, who heads up the Mosaic food pantry that was featured on the Kelly Clarkson Show. Shields and her husband decided to perform a couple of concerts on Zoom, figuring they could raise “a couple hundred dollars.”

“In the two concerts, we’ve done recently, we’ve raised over $10,000,” Shields said. “And we plan on doing more.”

Shields said anyone can donate to the cause.

In September, Shields and her husband joined the volunteers at the church who distribute more than 1,000 boxes of food to families twice a week. As time passed, they felt the need to do more for others during the pandemic, according to an Associated Press report.