Carol Stream church volunteers hand out more than 1,200 boxes of food
Crossroads Community Church of Carol Stream recently rallied at least 40 volunteers overnight to help distribute a semi truckload of free food.
Carol Stream Campus pastor the Rev. Austin Adams was contacted late in the evening Feb. 16 about a shipment from the USDA Farmers to Families initiative that no one had claimed for distribution. A whirlwind of distribution logistics followed.
More than 40 volunteers, including high school and Wheaton College students, created a plan for traffic flow and began an all-out social media blitz to get the word out. Their goal: to make the giveaway possible by the time the truck arrived at 1 p.m. Feb. 17 at the church, 1N100 Gary Ave.
As part of the national Coronavirus Food Assistance Program, USDA is purchasing $6 billion of agricultural products and partnering with national, regional and local distributors to supply family-sized boxes to workforces that have been impacted by the closure of restaurants, hotels and other food service businesses, according to USDA.gov.
Volunteers in Carol Stream handed out 1,248 boxes in the afternoon hours Wednesday.
"There seems to be no end to the number of ways this project has reached people," said Melissa Barber, director of communications for Crossroads.
She described one man who pulled up for food and said he was an out-of-work tradesman. A nearby volunteer heard the conversation and set up an interview for him at the heating and plumbing company she works for.
Another team of volunteers went to deliver food to a nearby low-income apartment complex and to four young girls who were each in need of food for their families.
"We heard of many folks delivering boxes to people without transportation or who were working and unable to make it to the event themselves," Barber said.
"One of our church members, who is a schoolteacher in Addison, ended up taking a dozen boxes of food to students in need from her district the next day."
The boxes were all the same, and each consisted of meat, cheese, milk, yogurt, potatoes, apples, onions, and carrots.
Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, the Crossroads Care Team has organized more than 50 service projects, including grocery and meal delivery, yardwork for families and individuals who can't get out, and providing meals and cellphone chargers for health care workers at local hospitals and nursing homes.
"We're always looking for creative ways to serve our community in meaningful ways. We would absolutely love to run another mass-food giveaway like this one again in the near future," said Barber.