Food pantries run by nonprofits, churches, schools and other groups are often all that stands between a poor family and going hungry. But what if a family is struggling so much that they can’t find transportation needed to reach a food pantry?
To alleviate this problem, the Salvation Army in High Point, N.C., started operating a mobile food pantry this month.
High Point Salvation Army social services director Tashina Oladunjoye explains the need for the service to Sarah Krueger of Fox 8: “We have individuals in low income apartments that are in dry, food desert areas. These are individuals who cannot get out to pantries. Who cannot get out to their local grocery stores because of transportation, money in general.”
Each week, the mobile food pantry visits two different apartment complexes, reaching eight different locations in total before returning the first so that the needy in each building receives food once a month. Oladunjoye aims to add a refrigerated truck to the program within six months so that she can provide fresh produce to the families.
Darlene Graves, a single mother who received food from the truck, tells Krueger, “I thank God for the program and I thank God for the Salvation Army. It’s going to help me feed my family another day.”
MORE: This Innovative Idea Brings Produce Directly to Low-Income Communities
Tag: the South
Why Is This 92-Year-Old World War II Veteran Kicking Field Goals?
Elderly veterans are working up a sweat as they kick field goals and ski under obstacles at the Ben Atchley State Veterans Home in Knoxville, Tenn., but they’re not having to hit the field or the slopes to do so.
These vets are competing in virtual sports — but the health benefits they receive are real.
Therapists are hooking up veterans to a virtual gaming system that involves their entire bodies in sports-themed movements. When Lori Tucker of ABC 6 visited the nursing home, 92-year-old World War II Army veteran Richard Gallaher scored all of the field goals he attempted.
“It’s a wonderful game because you get all the exercise you can do and it helps you with your balance and thinking and analyzing,” says Gallaher.
Each veteran plays a different game that build specific physical skills they need to work on, and it’s a little more exciting than the average therapy session, with onlookers cheering as the vets score.
Functional Pathways designed the gaming system, which president and CEO Dan Knorr describes as “almost like a Nintendo on steroids.” The veterans home is the first place they’ve introduced the therapeutic gaming system, but the company plans to roll it out at 140 facilities soon.
Greg Channell, one of the Veterans Home’s physical and occupational therapists, tells Tucker, “It’s fun to give back to someone whose given so much to us, and I think that’s a big part of being here.”
MORE: Meet the Marine-Turned-Doctor Helping Veterans Overcome PTSD
With Odds Stacked Against Them, This Group Is Helping to Build Self-Esteem in Young Black Women
“Babies raising babies,” is how Tracey Wilson Mourning, a former journalist and wife of retired Miami Heat basketball player Alonzo Mourning, describes the group of teenage girls carrying their children near her neighborhood in Florida to The Root.
“I wondered, ‘Which one am I?’ out of that group, had it not been for the mommy I had, had it not been for the amazing women in my life,” she says.
This questioning led Mourning to start a mentoring group for young black women called Honey Shine.
Since 2002, the organization has been reaching out to young black women in Florida, offering group mentorship, a six-week summer day camp and bi-monthly workshops focused on education, health, nutrition, sex and drug education, and making goals for the future. The participants are called “Honey Bugs,” and sharing warmth and affection among the generations is a big part of Honey Shine’s mission.
Honey Shine turns even fun events into learning experiences. For example, a back-to-school shopping trip sponsored by Forever21 that helped 100 girls pick out clothes for school was also an opportunity to teach the Honey Bugs about budgeting and “shopping smart.”
Mourning tells The Root that these girls benefit from guidance in all aspects of their lives. “I know a lot of these young girls don’t have that mom that I had, don’t have those people pulling them up by their coattails or taking them outside of their neighborhoods,” she says. “We have girls that come from neighborhoods called ‘the Graveyard’ where two out of 12 are graduating from high school. Not on our watch.”
Most of all, Mourning wants Honey Shine to show the girls the possibilities that await them if they stay out of trouble and get an education: “[Women] run companies. We own companies. We influence the world,” Mourning says. “And if our girls see that, what a difference that makes. Self-esteem is a powerful tool. We all make dumb mistakes when our self-esteem is low, and I don’t know anyone immune from that, but I feel like if we build self-esteem in our young girls…it makes the world of difference.”
MORE: When These Low-Income Women Needed Help, They Found An Answer in Each Other
This Veteran Literally Searches Through Shrubbery for Homeless Soldiers Needing Assistance
You can’t miss George Taylor — he’ll be the mustached man wearing a black cowboy hat, a shiny belt buckle and snakeskin boots searching through the bushes for homeless veterans to help along forested trails in Florida. When Taylor finds them, he brings them supplies or talks to them about how they can apply for benefits or find housing.
Taylor, who founded National Veterans Homeless Support (NVHS) in 2008, is passionate about this cause because, after serving in Vietnam and returning home with PTSD, he was once a homeless veteran himself. The 65-year-old Taylor eventually learned that he could apply for benefits because of his disability, and now his mission is to inform other vets about the help available to them.
For the past two decades, he’s been dedicated to the cause of helping homeless vets, which has served as an effective therapy for him. “I was a better person with PTSD by helping that other person,” Taylor tells R. Norman Moody of Florida Today. “I learned a long time ago that with PTSD you can eliminate some of the symptoms by staying busy.”
Since 1991, Taylor and his family have been helping vets. His kids even donated their allowances to the cause, and one of them, George Taylor Jr., grew up to become an Air Force Master sergeant and the vice president of NVHS.
For a long time, Taylor relied on donations and whatever funding he could scrape together to help veterans, but in 2012, the NVHS received a $1 million federal grant, followed by a $500,000 grant the year after. Unfortunately, the grants didn’t come through this year, but Taylor is trying to make up for the loss of funding through furious fundraising.
The infusion of funding allowed Taylor and NVHS to purchase, renovate and run five transitional housing units where 18 homeless vets can stay for up to two years while they try to become self-sufficient. Across Florida, NVHS also has held 16 stand down gatherings where struggling vets can receive medical and dental care, talk to counselors and learn about resources available to them.
Fifty-nine-year-old Adiel Brooks is one of the many veterans Taylor has helped over the years. Brooks has been staying in one of the transitional housing units for a few weeks, and now feels ready to try to reenter the upholstery business. “He is a good man,” Brooks says. “He is a good soldier. He looks out for me. He got me out of the woods.”
MORE: Inspired by Homeless Veterans in his Own Family, This Boy Scout Gives Those in His Community a Fresh Start
The Double Amputee Veteran That’s Now an Eye-Catching Cover Model
Noah Galloway of Birmingham, Ala., never dreamed of entering the military — then history intervened.
“There’s a lot of military history in my family, and I didn’t want anything to do with any of it,” Galloway says in a video for Men’s Health. “September 11th happened, and I was twenty years old, I was physically fit, and I just saw it as something I needed to do.” In October 2001, he enlisted.
Then during December 2005, Sergeant Galloway was serving in the Infantry in Iraq in when his unit received orders that required driving a Humvee into an area known as “the Triangle of Death” in Yusufiah. Driving with the headlights off and night vision goggles on, they didn’t see a trip wire, which detonated a roadside bomb as they drove over it. The explosion blasted Galloway into a canal and led to the amputation of both his left arm and leg.
Personal turmoil soon followed. “I thought more than a few times that it would have been better if I’d have just died,” he says. “I’d have been looked at like a hero. But instead, here I am, I’ve had two of my limbs taken from me. I would drink every day, but then I would go out in public and I was fine. There was this other side of me that I was just really hiding. I finally decided this has got to stop.”
Galloway joined a gym, began working out extensively and changed his diet. “Everything in my life started to improve,” he says.
The father of three now works as a personal trainer specializing in helping disabled vets, and he doesn’t let his clients get away with their excuses for not excelling. “Whatever it is that you tell me that you can’t do, we can find something to get it done,” he says. “I’ve had nothing but people try to help me. The least I can do is try to help anyone that’s in need around me.”
Most recently, Men’s Health named Galloway its “Ultimate Men’s Health Guy,” picking him from among the 1,246 contenders who entered the magazine’s first-ever contest and placing him on the November cover. Galloway won the reader’s choice poll of three finalists — finishing with more than 60,000 votes.
We bet that his inspiring story will motivate some couch potatoes to lace up their sneakers.
[ph]
MORE: A No-Brainer Job for Ex Drill Sergeants: Motivating the Rest of Us
This Organization Provides Shelter to Homeless Veterans Seeking Forgiveness
Like most veterans who end up homeless, the lives of Abe and Robin Horne of Sarasota, Fla. haven’t been perfect — which is why they needed some assistance when it comes to keeping a roof over their heads.
Both Hornes served in the military during the ’70s and ’80s, working a variety of jobs once they were discharged. Then in 2011, Abe was laid off from his position as a resort groundskeeper, suffering a heart attack soon after. The following year, Robin was arrested for disorderly conduct and had a seizure while she was in jail, the first of many health problems related to her epilepsy.
With their ability to work diminished and their resources tapped, the Hornes lost their housing and ended up sleeping at the Salvation Army, where they were rousted at dawn every day to head out onto the streets again.
Eventually, they turned to the Jewish Family and Children’s Service of Sarasota-Manatee (JFCS) for help. For five years, the JFCS has run Operation Military Assistance Program, which just scored a large grant from the Department of Veterans Affairs, giving it $1.2 million to help homeless veterans in the area.
JFCS case manager Liberty Veedon tells Billy Cox of the Herald-Tribune that it was challenging to find programs that the Hornes would qualify for and housing that would accept them. “Their history became a major impediment to placing them,” she says. “Their health is not good, they have one or two evictions and credit issues. Usually we can place a client within 10 to 15 days and within six or seven months they’re back on their feet. This took a lot longer.”
The JFCS has an 80 percent success record with keeping veterans in their homes, an impressive number given that many of the veterans they work with suffer from PTSD, substance abuse or other health issues.
The JFCS didn’t give up, however, and now the Hornes are living in their own unit in a triplex, and they don’t have to worry about losing it. “If it wasn’t for these guys helping us,” Abe Horne says, “I don’t know where we’d be. We were lost.”
The people at the JFCS are putting out the word that they have resources to help veterans in need of assistance — even if those former soldiers haven’t had a squeaky-clean post-service record.
Abe regrets his past decisions that led to the predicament of homelessness. “It doesn’t take much to get homeless and I’ll admit I’ve done a poor job managing my finances,” he tells Cox. “Some people, they don’t care and they accept the fact that they’re homeless. But I’ve slept with one eye open and I’ve lost my dignity and that’s no way to live. I credit (JFCS) for helping me get my disability and for keeping us alive.”
MORE: For Veterans Transitioning Off the Streets, This Organization Makes Them Feel Right At Home
The All-Hands-on-Desk Initiative to Improve Low-Performing Schools in Tennessee
If several educators have their say, teachers, not Elvis, will come to mind when you think about Memphis. That’s because they have a bold plan to turn the Tennessee city into Teacher Town, USA.
The Shelby County school district (where Memphis is located) has identified 68 schools in its purview performing in the bottom 5 percent of the state. Pledging to bring these failing Memphis schools into the top 25 percent of Tennessee educational facilities (an unprecedented turnaround challenge proposed by the Achievement School District and Shelby County) in five years, superintendents Dorsey Hopson and Chris Barbic are using every lesson plan they can find to do right by their kids.
To create the best classroom environments, Shelby is taking a three-pronged approach for “1) retaining great teachers, 2) developing local teacher talent, and 3) recruiting national talent,” according to the Stanford Social Innovation Review.
As Sara Solar, portfolio director of the Teacher Town USA funding initiative explains, “We know that transforming Memphis … will require that we work at every stage of the teacher life cycle — from novices to our strongest teacher leaders.”
As a part of this initiative, they’re focusing on cultivating young teachers with the leadership and guidance of older educators and encouraging them to build a strong, personal and lasting bond with the community.
Knowing that big changes always come up against entrenched political, economical and racial tensions, Shelby started bringing together representatives from the schools (public and charter), civic organizations, non-profits, universities and others to start a discussion on “how to make Memphis the best place in America for great teachers.” Consulting the philosophy of “high-stakes donor collaborations,” Shelby’s school district is using the newest and best ideas out there to push the envelope into the future and secure long-range funding and philanthropy for their school programs.
One of the funders, Jim Boyd, sums up the initiative very nicely: “We know we have this moment in time, and something concrete and specific to work on together…And so we partner even when it’s hard. Perhaps because what makes it hard is also what makes it powerful.”
When an Elderly Veteran Tried to Build a Wheelchair Ramp, These Volunteers Didn’t Let Him Go at it Alone
Eighty-six-year-old Navy veteran John Walker of Gulfport, Miss., is used to taking care of himself. So when his wife Kathleen broke her leg, he decided to build a wheelchair ramp to make it easier to get her in and out of the house.
But when the Retired Senior Volunteer Program of Harrison County (RSVP), learned about the situation, the group contacted Disability Connection, a nonprofit that helps with emergency home repairs and modifications for veterans, the disabled and low-income families.
Disability Connection executive director Janie O’Keefe tells Trang Pham-Bui of WLOX that after Walker build his ramp, “We came and inspected it and it did not look like it was as safe as it should be. It did not look like it would survive long term, so we agreed to basically start over and give him a fresh, brand-new ramp.”
At first Walker refused the help. “I’m used to doing for myself, for my family,” he said. But he soon realized he and his wife could use the support of people like U.S. Army Specialist Kegan Wood, who pitched in to build the new ramp using materials that the Home Depot donated. Pham-Bui asked Walker how he felt to see so many people volunteering to work on the project and he says, “It makes me want to cry.”
“If anybody deserves it, you and your wife do,” O’Keefe tells Walker.
We couldn’t have said it better ourselves.
MORE: Two NFL Players Surprise a Veteran Dedicated to Helping Service Members
The Label You Should Look for at Your Supermarket
Farming runs in Robert Elliot’s family — but he never expected that he’d make a living off of the land.
Instead, he served in the Marines, completing five years of active duty service before returning to the U.S. and taking a job as a contractor for the Marine Corps. In 2011, he was abruptly laid off along with many others due to budget cuts, and he didn’t know what to do. “It was hard to make ends meet so I moved home,” he tells Shumurial Ratliff of WNCN News.
Back home in Louisburg, N.C., on the land his family used to farm, Elliot decided to try his hand at the old family profession, establishing Cypress Hall Farms with the help of the nonprofit Farmer Veteran Coalition.
The organization supports veterans looking to transition into farming with resource guides, training and funding opportunities. It partners with Homegrown by Heroes to help veteran farmers label their produce with a patriotic-looking sticker that informs consumers know that they’re buying food grown by vets.
According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, only 17 percent of the American population lives in rural areas, but 45 percent of those who serve in the military are from rural America. At the same time, American farmers are aging, averaging 55.9 years and returning veterans face higher unemployment than non-veterans. Many people think the perfect solution to these problems is to convince some veterans to return to their rural roots and take up farming.
Elliot, who specializes in pasture-raised meats and organic vegetables, agrees. “A lot of farmers now are getting up in age,” Elliot tells Ratliff. “They are retiring, they are getting out of farming. We are losing farms left and right. There is nobody better suited for the job to take over where America’s food is going to come from tomorrow than veterans. We are already adapted to the outside, we like to work hard, we know what we have to do. We will get the job done.”
Elliot, who also spends time teaching other veterans how to farm, told a group of people at the Rural Advancement Foundation International (RAFI) that he revamped his family’s farm from a traditional approach to a sustainable one because, “Being a veteran, I don’t mind putting in the manual labor required to farm sustainably.”
MORE: A Nonprofit that Helps Vets Get Involved in Sustainable Agriculture
How to Ease the Move from Battlefield to Boardroom
Retired Lt. Col. John Phillips of Atlanta, Ga. knows a few things about making the transition from a military career to a civilian one. After he served for more than 20 years in the Army, he began to work for Coca-Cola, where he is currently a mid-level finance executive and the founder of the beverage company’s Military Veterans Business Resource Group. Earlier this year, he published a book, Boots To Loafers: Finding Your New True North, to help those recently retired from the service make a similar career move.
Phillips discussed with Bill Hendrick of the Atlanta Journal Constitution some of the tips he shares in the book. “Always remember you know more than you think you do,” he says. “Also, if you’ve been the service a long time and been successful, you’ll likely have to work at first for someone half your age and who has no idea what you’ve done, and doesn’t care.”
Phillips outlines the three phases he believes each veteran will experience as he or she leaves military life: Transition, transformation, and integration.
One goal of the book is to build veterans’ confidence in their abilities to solve the less-than-dire problems they will face in the corporate world. Phillips writes on his website, “Many times in my civilian career I have come across a crisis, or what others perceived as a crisis, that did not compare to the catastrophes I experienced while in uniform. For example, no one has yelled at me, shot at me, or tried to blow me up since leaving the military. Instead, someone has simply spent too much money and is over budget or someone has not served the kind of soup expected in the company cafeteria and that turns into an instant crisis for some in the private sector.”
Phillips advises vets seeking jobs to start their job searches with vet-friendly companies, study the corporate culture of the business they are applying to and learn how to explain that the skills they built in the military will be useful in a civilian job.
“The people listening may not have a clue,” Phillips tells Hendrick. “And they might look at a resume for about three seconds. So you’ve got to spell out what you can do for them.”
MORE: Can You 3D Print A Car? This Program Trains Veterans How