(Food-Beverage-News.Com, December 03, 2013 ) Dothan, AL – A small program started in 1999 has helped numerous homeless and downtrodden people get a start out of poverty while helping the Los Angeles community get cleaner. Food on Foot began providing meals for the needy every Sunday on the steps of Hollywood’s post office in 1996. In 1999 the organization began recruiting members of the homeless community to pick up litter in exchange for food gift cards. Participants in the program are provided with two large garbage bags and directed to an area needing cleaned. On returning the bags full of trash, the worker is provided with $10 in food gift cards, a chicken dinner and some healthy fruit and snacks.
As the worker shows reliability and desire over time, they are slowly transitioned into a cleaning crews for shopping centers and other areas around Hollywood for additional food gift cards. The end goal is for the worker to develop strong work practices then to be able to find steady employment and break the cycle poverty can create. Currently between forty and fifty homeless and poor people participate in the trash for food program.
Chandra will be graduating from the program soon and is an example of what can be done to help people. When she started collecting trash for food she was living out of her car, but now has a full-time position at a postal center and resides in an apartment.
Food on Foot holds its weekly meal each Sunday afternoon at 3:15 at 1625 N. Schrader Blvd. in Hollywood. About 200 meals are served by volunteers. Each meal service costs $2000 to $2500 for food and gift cards. For a minimum $20 donation anyone can volunteer to help serve the meals.
This organization can be contacted through their website, www.foodonfoot.org, or by calling 310-442-0088.
