Rotary Club food pack addresses food insecurity in Gwinnett
Wintery weather didn’t hamper volunteers from getting to Viewpoint Health in Lawrenceville on Saturday, February 8, 2020, but as the snow continued to fall outside of the building, volunteers began to wonder if driving home would be more difficult.
Peachtree Ridge High School senior Jodhi Parson wondered, along with about seven other volunteers from Peachtree Ridge’s Interact Club, while sealing plastic bags full of macaroni, cheese and soy. Parson said Peachtree Ridge’s club is fond of food packing and clothing drives.
“I think the amount of volunteers is insane,” Parson said. “There are so many people who want to come out in this snowy weather to come together, unite and pack food together.”
None of the volunteers from Gwinnett-area rotary clubs were trapped, but there was a slight inconvenience. A bus that was meant to transport the boxes of meals from Viewpoint Health was caught in a traffic jam on Ga. Highway 316. Volunteers decided to leave the boxes at Viewpoint and transport them in their own vehicles on Monday.
The majority of the boxes of meals will be moved to Lawrenceville ministry Nothing But the Truth, where they will eventually be distributed to Gwinnett County Public Schools students through school counselors. A few stayed at Viewpoint Health to serve their clients.
Each box contains roughly 32 meal packs. Each pack contains about six servings of macaroni, cheese and soy. By about 11:30 a.m. on Saturday the 100 volunteers from Rotary clubs across Gwinnett had packed 18,000 meals.
Rotary Club of Gwinnett Assistant Governor Brandy Swanson said Saturday’s food pack was the first for Rotary Club of Gwinnett in the sense that previous food packs shipped food elsewhere, sometimes overseas. This year, the rotary volunteers turned their attention to the need in Gwinnett County. Swanson said she volunteered at another rotary food packing event that delivered local donations. Several of the rotary clubs in Gwinnett held a presidents’ meeting, and they decided to plan the joint project.
“It was really the club presidents that decided, ‘Hey, let’s get together and support this and do a joint program that will be beneficial for our communities,” Swanson said.
Data from the Community Foundation of Northeast Georgia shows 10% of Gwinnett County is considered food insecure. The volunteers from about seven Gwinnett-area rotary clubs acquired food from a South Florida nonprofit called Meals for Hope. Thousands of pounds of noodles and soy were transported to Viewpoint Health for packing.
Volunteers were divided into four lanes. People carried buckets of macaroni from a large box and poured it into a container for volunteers to scoop from. While one volunteer held a bag open two more poured in noodles and soy. The vacuum-sealed cheese was placed in the bag, then passed to another volunteer to seal it. Once there were about 32 stacked at the end of the table, a box was sealed and moved for storage. Volunteers began at 10 a.m. and worked through lunch time into the afternoon.
While the Rotary Club of Gwinnett made up the largest contingent of volunteers, the army of hands packing mac and cheese were made of half-a-dozen-or-so volunteers from various clubs throughout the county.
Karen Eggers said she was one of about five volunteers from the Rotary Club of Gwinnett Mosaic. Clayton Knox, from Rotary Club of Duluth, was one of about seven or eight volunteers from his club. The culmination of several modest teams made a formidable packing force on Saturday.
“On a weekly basis, we have these speakers that come in and talk about the needs in Gwinnett County,” Knox said. “When you hear of that happening in your county, that really makes you want to do something.”