Yokefellow readies for Hunger Walk

By: Chyna Broadnax | Mooresville Tribune
Published: September 02, 2009

Yokefellow Ministries is preparing for its annual Hunger Walk campaign.

But first the ministry is getting some help from the BB&T Webb Insurance "Steps of Light" team.

Yokefellow is hosting a community kick-off event to get people thinking about the Hunger Walk in October.

BB&T Webb Insurance will sponsor a Poor Boy Dinner at 6:30 p.m. on Sept. 10.

The dinner will be at First Baptist Church in Adams Hall.

BB&T Webb Insurance Agency Manager Charlene Smith said the dinner is to help get more people to support the Hunger Walk.

"(We're) trying to get more community leaders involved and interested in this so we can get more donations than in the past," she said.

Dinner will consist of pinto beans, cole slaw, cornbread and more.

Anyone interested in learning about the Hunger Walk who wants to participate in collecting donations should attend the dinner.

Smith hopes "anyone who feels this is a worthy cause" will attend.

At the Poor Boy Dinner, the guest speaker will be Billy Riddle, the founder of Why the Woods, an organization that serves those in need.

Riddle, 23, took a year off from college and football at Appalachian State to visit Sudan and start his organization.

He said he agreed to speak at the dinner because he wants to get people moving and "doing stuff to make the world better."

"My job is to encourage those who are blessed and have the ability to give," he said. "It's my job to encourage them to give and give them a way to do that."

Those who attend will be asked to collect donations for the Hunger Walk and will be given special bags to put them in.

Hunger Walk
The walk will be at Mac Anderson Park on Oct. 3. Registration begins at 8:30 a.m. and the walk starts at 9 a.m.

Last year's walk raised $7,600 and some 70 people walked, according to Yokefellow Director Neil Furr.

"The needs have tripled so we'd like to see the interest triple," he said.

In June, 541 people received food bags from Yokefellow. By the end of the year, Furr anticipates they will have helped 5,200 people with food.

"Any time we fill up the pantry in two to three days (the food) is gone," he said.

Yokefellow staff are having to shop at local grocery stores to supplement the pantry between trips to Second Harvest Food Bank of Northwest N.C. in Winston-Salem.

"I don't expect things to slow down, but pick up with unemployment the way it is," Furr said.