Just One Meal

About 2 months ago, I began working on the "Just One Meal" Campaign with Project Hospitality.  This is one of my main missions while I am here.

About a year ago, an Americorps Vista was working on this project and she hadn't gotten very far when the unthinkable happened: Superstorm Sandy struck.  To say that normal projects were set aside would be an understatement.  All progress on this campaign came to a halt... except that churches that had signed up were still committed to providing and serving.

So, what is the Just One Meal campaign?

Well, Project Hospitality has a drop-in center for people who need a place to go during the day.  Most of the clients who use this facility are homeless, and the drop-in center gives them a warm place for cold days and a cool place for warm days.  They can also come for a hot cup of coffee, a shower, a change of clothes and just a place to sit in a chair and rest.  On every day, three meals are served for 50-60 clients.

As you can imagine, this is a huge budget item for Project Hospitality.  In order to cut down on the costs, we're partnering with various faith groups on Staten Island to provide just one meal every month for the drop-in center.  Right now, we have four different religions represented in the meals and there's the opportunity for even more to jump on board.  We have also filled half of our dinner-time meals with church-provided meals, cutting the monthly dinner budget in half.

So, what do the churches do?  They cook or prepare 5-6 trays of food ahead of time and then deliver it.  Our staff takes care of reheating it and serving it.  It is quite a commitment for the smaller churches, but it's a way of serving that doesn't take people out of their comfort zones and is more behind the scenes - especially perfect for churches just getting started with their social action or missions groups.  So good.