Feed Durham Packs Holiday Groceries For 800 Durham and Moore County Households
Durham, NC – Feed Durham is spreading hope and stability to households that are struggling to make ends meet by packing and giving away close to a thousand grocery bags for the December holiday season. This past weekend (Dec. 16 – 18), over 150 volunteers gathered at a private residence to pack 18,000 pounds of fresh produce and chicken for 800 households in Durham and Moore County, where hundreds of residents’ food spoiled during a 5-day power outage earlier this month.
The grocery bags contain a cornucopia of raw food materials to prepare a traditional holiday meal – cabbage, kale, collards, red potatoes, sweet potatoes, onions, carrots, celery, oranges, apples, poultry, eggs, butter, bread, a variety of spices, and a handwritten Love Note from community members on Feed Durham stationery.
The Holiday Grocery Give-Away is made possible through the generous support of Farmer Foodshare; Bread donations from 9th Street Bakery; Printing donations from Spee Dee Que; grants from Blueprint NC and Southern Vision Alliance; and the financial support of several hundred donors through Feed Durham’s GoFundMe page.
Katina Parker, a Durham-based filmmaker, launched the Feed Durham initiative in April 2020 when it became evident that the pandemic and the accompanying economic hardships impacting her neighbors weren’t going anywhere soon. The Feed Durham Stewardship Team has convened a total of 12 no-contact cookouts, prepared 20,000 meals, and donated more than 100,000 pounds of produce to local communities through a myriad of partnerships with groups like The Mustard Seed Project and Refugee Community Partners.
Durham, like other cities around the country, has seen a rise in food scarcity, evictions, and unemployment as the COVID pandemic continues to ravage our nation.
With so many people facing food insecurity and unprecedented economic hardships, Feed Durham aims to sow hope and shift Durhamites towards deepening relationships within our communities and caring for one another.
ABOUT FEED DURHAM NC
Founded by filmmaker Katina Parker, Feed Durham is a scrappy mutual aid collective that came together in response to mounting hunger in the Durham area, due to COVID. Since 2020, we’ve fed 100,000+ neighbors in need through our massive no-contact cookouts, where we lovingly prepare meals for 500 people per day, and offer grocery giveaways. We feed elders, people living in cars and on the streets, widows, unsupported LGBTQ+ folks, undocumented families, the homebound and chronically ill, elementary students, and their families.