Embroiled in a nasty divorce, the woman and her 13-year-old son pulled up in front of the Chattanooga Community Kitchen on East 11th Street a few weeks ago.
For years a resident of one of the city’s wealthiest zip codes, she came home one day to find that her estranged husband had changed the locks on the couple’s McMansion. She hadn’t yet consulted an attorney concerning her rights. She and her son had been sleeping in her Cadillac Escalade for more than a week.
The moral of the story?
“The homeless aren’t always who you think they are,” said Mark Williams, the Community Kitchen’s case management director. “Just because you’re driving an Escalade doesn’t mean you have a garage to park it in.”
One thousand or more men, women and children are expected to park themselves inside the CK today to enjoy all the traditional Thanksgiving fixings: turkey and dressing, green beans, sweet potato casserole, rolls, pumpkin pie. The CK typically welcomes no more than half that number for the vast majority of the 180,000 meals it serves each year.
Nor will those 1,000 or so hungry souls merely eat. They’ll be served by more than 100 volunteers, as well as more than 50 full- and part-time CK staffers.
“Most of the time our clients go through a line for their food, cafeteria style,” said David Costello, who’s been the kitchen’s community engagement director the past two years. “But not at Thanksgiving or Christmas. They’ll enjoy a sit-down meal. Our volunteers will wait on them, fill their drinks when needed, things like that. It’s always nice to be able to share with others.”
Mark WiedmerThe Scenic City justifiably has become known for its sharing spirit. Two years ago, CraftWorks donated much time and money to modernize and enlarge the CK’s outdated, undersized kitchen. Early this morning, the 16th annual Grateful Gobbler Walk 5K at Coolidge Park will turn over 100 percent of the proceeds to the running of the Maclellan Shelter for Families, a emergency shelter located next to the Community Kitchen.
Opened in 2014, the Maclellan facility has 13 units containing a total of 68 beds for homeless families. Anyone wishing to support the shelter and the kitchen can learn more about doing so at community-kitchen.org.
“As it gets colder, our mission becomes more and more about homelessness,” Costello continued. “We’ve never turned anybody away for lack of room. We’ve welcomed close to 200 on a few occasions. But the family shelter has allowed us to keep up to 13 families together.”
Ever since the economic disaster of 2008, the incidences of family homelessness have risen dramatically, up as much as 300 percent from a decade ago, according to local service providers. A similar study by the Department of Housing and Urban Development shows Chattanooga had more than 600 homeless individuals in early 2015.
After being forced to walk away from her job at Amazon due to transportation issues, Kesha House wasn’t yet homeless, but she desperately needed a job.
“I entered the ‘Help 2’ program here at the Kitchen,” said House, who said she once participated in basketball, softball and track at Hixson High School. “It’s a 90-day program. I’ve been here nine months now. I’m a kitchen manager. It’s helped me in so many ways. I’ve lived here all my life and I didn’t even know this place existed until someone told me they might be able to help me.”
The Community Kitchen always needs help from those with the means to provide it. Its annual Fast Day fundraiser is only halfway to its goal of the $700,000 it needs for its yearly budget. Though a recent food drive netted more than 900 frozen turkeys to cook through the holiday season, as well as more than 10 tons of food total, there’s always a need for more.
Especially since, as Costello noted, “almost everything we use is donated.”
Across our great nation today many of us will give thanks for all we have and all who love us and those dedicated military servicemen and women, police and firefighters who protect our way of life every minute of every day.
“The truth is, even the most destitute among the people we help is blessed to live in this country,” Costello said.
It isn’t perfect. Too many still fall through the cracks. Others never will take full advantage of the help they’re given. Good people will continue to endure bad things through no fault of their own, their calamities often pulling in their spouses and children.
But at least we have organizations such as the Community Kitchen determined to soften the blows.
Said the CK’s Brandon Ritchie when asked what makes him most proud of the work he does: “You always get to help somebody some way, and in lots of different ways.”
No testimony may better describe the diversity of that help than a five-minute audio on the CK’s website. In words both raw and elegant, lifelong alcoholic Mary says of the salvation she found there: “They put hope where there was no hope.”
And is there anything to be thankful for more than the power of hope?
Contact Mark Wiedmer at mwiedmer@timesfreepress.com.