Come to the Hearing on March 22, 2016, to Support FoodFirst Community Kitchen in Carrboro

From the IFC Website: “The IFC has met with the Board of Aldermen to start the process for FoodFirst, but we need your continued advocacy and support to bring this vision to reality!  A public hearing will be held on Wednesday, March 22, 2016, and we would love to see as many friendly faces as possible to speak on behalf of FoodFirst. You can find more details about this project atwww.ifcfoodfirst.org!”

Statement of Support for IFC Community Kitchen in Carrboro:

Weaver Community Housing Association would like to voice its support of the IFC locating the Food First community kitchen in downtown Carrboro.  WCHA is concerned about public safety for all of its residents and that includes those of low-income and marginalized populations.   Hence, our organization does not support criminalization of the homeless by spreading fear of panhandling and loitering.  The existence of poor residents is not a public safety issue. Tactics such as these have been used by many cities to push the poor and homeless farther out of town where they are invisibilized. We stand with the National Coalition for Homeless and their Homeless Bill Of Rights and recognize that violence and marginalization of the homeless is a national problem.

We also recognize the the Food First kitchen will be supplying groceries to many families who plan to cook meals in their home and that a focus on fears of “idle persons” is largely unwarranted. Roughly 1.7 million people in North Carolina live in poverty, which amounts to about 1 in 5 people.  There is an overwhelming need for centralized, community services especially now that the state of North Carolina has stopped supplying food stamps to those without work.  We also recognize that people of color disproportionately make up these affected groups at, by some estimates, roughly 78% of those who live in poverty in our state.  When we choose to make these services less accessible, we do so at a detriment to these marginalized groups.  We ask that Carrboro businesses and the town to make the decision to support these community efforts downtown and stand up for those who are struggling in our communities.  We also ask for other local organizations to sign on to this statement.

To have your organization sign on to this letter, contact thebog@wcha.coop