My Saturday with the group feeding Kensington

A few weeks ago, I received word that a community aid group up in Kensington was expecting the city to show up at their outreach. So on Saturday, September 12, I went down to their usual distribution site to see what was going on.

The Everywhere Project has been known and trusted in Kensington for years. When I went to their regular Saturday food and necessities distribution, they were on their usual corner at Ruth and Clearfield, with about 10 tables of hot food, beverages, bread and assorted snacks. The group also gives out harm reduction supplies, clothing and has a little library for children in the area; that section is an unexpected moment of color and creativity in an area high in cortisol. 

After noon, the TEP truck filled with food supplies pulled up to the corner, and volunteers, mostly young women, congregated out front, awaiting directions. TEP's Jen Shinefeld and Tom Frey organized the volunteers into groups, and everyone was set into motion. They divide into groups to set up tables, prepare the hot food area, while wearing masks, and organize the line of recipients, who wait on the corner before TEP shows up.  

But this week something was different. Right behind the usual food distribution site - an approved distribution site listed on the city of Philadelphia’s free food sites list and in their handy PDF - the parking lot at Ruth and Clearfield now housed the city’s mobile resource van. the van is part of a program known as the “Kensington Blitz”, a weeks-long initiative to clean up the area.

Because of the presence of city officials in and out of the parking lot, nerves were high at the TEP outreach. Still, during that time, TEP served at least two hundred people, by my visual estimate, and everyone was orderly, waited in line, and thanked the volunteers. There was no trash left on the street. When a garbage truck pulled up, volunteers had trash bags ready and thrown into the truck. “They already did it!” remarked the driver as the truck pulled away. 

At the outset of distribution, a city official came out of the parking lot to ask The Everywhere Project for their licenses. Licenses were shown, and the official left. A few hours into service, two health department officials showed up to look over the food being served. The two officials took the temperature of food being served, and made remarks about how bread was placed on an open table, "self service," they called it, even though the bread was handed to recipients by volunteers, and not picked up by individuals. The officials mentioned that they would send more comments to Frey, who is director of operations for TEP. I asked if officials had ever been out to ask for these licenses before. “No,” Frey said. So why now? 

The One Philly Kensington Blitz Initiative aims to join social outreach with clean streets initiatives to “take back Kensington.” Similar programs have been launched in the past to various degrees of success; Kensington is still dangerous and people are in need of basic necessities. Residents and people who congregate in that area have a mistrust of programs like this, launched by the city, heralded widely by officials, and then abandoned.

During my four hours at that intersection, I did not see one person enter the lot with the purposes of receiving help at the city's mobile van station.

So, it’s curious why the city groups working on the "blitz" wouldn’t try to work with groups on the ground who have already earned the trust of the community. In Seattle, similar programs for public health have been met with success, with King County Public Health working with trusted mutual aid groups to lessen communicable diseases and provide COVID vaccines. 

It’s unclear, as of this writing, why the city would start asking questions of a charity they've already known the existence of, and even promoted on their site. But it’s something to watch, considering the many, many mutual aid groups providing basic necessities the city is not. Will Philadelphia officials take the temperature of every group that serves food in Kensington, including church groups that set up mobile distribution? Will they begin asking for safe serve certificates from other mutual aid groups? And why haven't they included anyone who is out serving food in their hunger task force, instead opting for executives?

What you can do

The Everywhere Project is always looking for volunteers for it's LOVE Park and Kensington food distribution programs. Sign up here.