Community Kitchen's Fast Day campaign short of goal

The Community Kitchen isn't desperate, but organizers say it could use some help to meet its $700,000 fundraising goal.

"We're about $175,000 short, so we're really counting on people to help us out between now and the end of the year to make that deficit up or we'll have to go back in January and take a look at programs and staffing," said Charlie Hughes, the kitchen's executive director.

The kitchen's Fast Day campaign is its biggest fundraiser of the year, starting in the fall and ending the second week in January. The idea is that people give up at least one meal and donate money for that meal to the Community Kitchen.

The kitchen has met its fundraising goals for the last five years, and Hughes hopes this year will be no different. Cutting staff, such as a maintenance person, will force other staff to do more work, he said, and most already have more than one task at the kitchen.

"If the goal is not reached the community kitchen will have to scale back some services," said Fast Day campaign chairman William Aiken, a local attorney. "We regard all the services vital to meeting the needs of our community. There's not much else to say. Meeting the goal is critical."

The kitchen will take donations until Jan. 10 before making decisions about its 2012 budget.

"Heaven forbid I might have to go back into the kitchen and cook," joked Hughes, who worked as the kitchen's weekend cook from 1991 to 1993.

"This is not meant to be a gloom-and-doom type of thing," he said. "A lot of people make year-end gifts, so we still have a few days."

The kitchen's finance director, Vanessa Blevins, said she still has hope.

"God knows what we need for next year's budget," said Blevins. "I've been here 14 years, so we've seen it through floods and everything else, and I just believe our giving community is still out there."

De-Sica Steele, 44, is among 300 to 400 people a day who used the center this year to get food, shelter, life-skills classes or medical care.

"It's been a blessing to me," she said.

She slept in a her car for a year before seeking help at the kitchen, she said. Her case manager at the kitchen helped her work with the Chattanooga Housing Authority to get a College Hill Courts apartment this month and she returned to the day center this week to get help with furnishing it.

"Since I've been here, I've seen the doctor, I've had prescriptions taken care of," she said. "They feed you. They clothe you."

The kitchen's case management staff is covered under grants from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, but most of its bills are paid from money from the Fast Day campaign, Hughes said.

"We're talking about the nuts-and bolts-types of things -- the power bill, the insurance, some of the payroll, the cleaning supplies, those kinds of things that aren't donated," he said.

Hughes also hoped for money from the Fast Day campaign to pay for a day center manager.

The day center hosts the kitchen's job-training programs, laundry facilities, computers and social activities. Lawyers visit weekly to offer free services and nursing students from the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga come weekly to offer foot care for the homeless.

"The programs and activities in there have gotten so large in number that we actually need a person to help supervise that so we can move people on through the programs to get jobs and housing," said Hughes.