A group of local community organizers and mayors introduced an online fundraiser for Second Harvest Food stuff Bank of Northeast Tennessee and Feeding Southwest Virginia on Monday, in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
“We know that Dr. King was fixated on troubles these kinds of as starvation and, normally speaking, poverty, so it appeared to be correct that we work with [those food banks],” claimed Adam Dickson, who served arrange the party.
The fundraiser, which runs via Jan. 31, was declared by way of a Facebook video clip showcasing opinions from Dickson and a string of other MLK Working day Jr. event coordinators and nonprofit leaders from the area. Sullivan County Mayor Richard Venable also spoke, alongside with the two Bristol mayors and leaders from other regional metropolitan areas and counties.
Rhonda Chafin, government director of Next Harvest, reiterated what she’s been saying for months now: Food stuff financial institutions are viewing a enormous spike in desire amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
“Since the pandemic, we have seen a 20% raise in foods insecurity in Northeast Tennessee,” Chafin claimed. “… just in 10 months, we have had a 142% improve more than the calendar year prior, from [distributing] 4.7 million foods in [2019]…to 11,600,000 [over that 10-month period] this year.”
Tracey Edwards, 2nd Harvest’s local community relations manager, claimed that Dickson at first proposed the fundraiser as a common food stuff travel with actual physical pickup locations, but the group shifted to an on the web format due to the fact of the pandemic.