ATLANTA — In its 50th year, the annual Thanksgiving Hosea Feeds the Hungry event looked a lot different this year because of the ongoing pandemic.
Channel 2′s Kristen Holloway was at the Georgia World Congress Center, where the event took place outside. One contactless station was set up where families could drive up and get their Thanksgiving boxes with a turkey and extras inside. Another station was set up for the homeless to get turkey sandwiches, chips, a drink, a mask and hand sanitizer.
Holloway talked to Hosea Helps CEO Elisabeth Omilami about the challenge of planning the event this year. She said the last thing they wanted to do was cancel.
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“People are hurting,” Omilami said. “There’s no stimulus money coming down. At lot of people have lost jobs. It’s just unique. And this pandemic we’re in, they will be very happy to get this food.”
U.S. Senate candidate Rev. Raphael Warnock helped distribute meals at the event on Thanksgiving morning.
Channel 2′s Nicole Carr talked to Warnock, who praised the volunteers and organizers feeding the homeless Thursday.
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“They enrich all of use, because we are tied together. If my neighbor is uncovered, then I’m unprotected,” Warnock said. “So today, we feed the hungry and the homeless. Tomorrow we ask the hard questions about why people are hungry and homeless in the wealthiest nation in the world.”
On Wednesday, Warnock’s incumbent challenger, Sen. Kelly Loeffler, was back on the trail after a COVID-19 diagnosis and two recent back-to-back negative tests.
Loeffler spoke to Channel 2 Action News for the first time at a Gwinnett County food co-op that has gone from seeing a dozen families a day to seeing 55 daily.
Loeffler said her focus is on COVID-19 relief for Georgia families.
“I’m going to be pushing for it, because it’s things like schools, money for schools to reopen, money for small businesses, but also for child care,” Loeffler said. “Parents can’t get back to work if they don’t have that child care option, so I want to make sure that’s there.”
