Group gears up to feed families in need

• Photo:OneRosemount

OneRosemount Feeding Families will send packaged meals to the Dominican Republic to help Haitian refugees who fled to the country after a devastating earthquake.

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During his travels, pastor Bill Goodwin has seen hunger and its effects on people, especially children. On a recent trip to Uganda, Goodwin visited a school where they could only feed about a third of their students lunch on any given day. The scene broke his heart and inspired him to take action.

While solving world hunger is beyond his capabilities, Goodwin knew he could do something and he decided he should get his whole community involved as well. And so the idea for One Rosemount Feeding Families was born.

One Rosemount Feeding Families is a daylong event aimed at impacting lives locally and globally through a communitywide effort to provide food to those in need. The event will take place March 2 and is being sponsored by OneRosemount, a group of Rosemount leaders including mayor Bill Droste, school principals, church pastors and others.

“We want to bring the community together on a common project,” said Goodwin.

The major project of the day will be packing food for Haitian refugees that have fled to the Dominican Republic. Working with ImpactLives, a nonprofit organization, Rosemount volunteers will pack 286,120 meals to be shipped to the refugees. Goodwin said more than 2 million Haitians have fled to the Dominican Republic after a devastating earthquake did significant damage across the island country in 2010.

“We want to help people in need and the Dominican Republic is an area in a lot of need,” said Goodwin.

For the food packing, assembly lines will be set up at Rosemount Middle School and Rosemount Elementary School. Goodwin said they will put together lines made up of 10 people and those lines will package a nutritious rice/soy mixture. The goal is to provide 286,120 meals that will be shipped to the Dominican Republic.

There are a number of organizations that provide similar services, One Rosemount chose ImpactLives because they also will provide a travel opportunity to anyone who wants to visit the Dominican Republic. If there is enough interest, Goodwin said, a group from Rosemount will travel in August to hand deliver the meals.

Packing the meals will require between 1,200 and 1,500 volunteers. Registration has started and event co-chair Tom Meaden said so far 270 people have volunteered. There will be five two-hour shifts of meal packing. He said various community groups have expressed enthusiasm at the project and he’s confident they will get the help they need.

“I think it’s going to be a good event,” said Meaden.

To pay for the meals, One Rosemount has a goal to raise $71,250. Goodwin said the meals cost .25 a piece. That includes the cost of the raw materials, packaging and shipping of the meals. A $54 donation feeds a family of six one meal a day for a month.

Goodwin said they hope to get people young, old and anywhere in between involved in the effort. He said kids as young as those in kindergarten can participate. To help garner support for the event, the group has been going around to groups in the community to explain the event.

To help people locally, there will be a food drive to aid area food shelves and a community resource fair to help raise awareness of opportunities available in Rosemount. Meaden said they will see how this year goes but they hope to make the event into an annual community activity.

“We are doing something bigger than ourselves,” said Goodwin.

For more information about the event or to sign up to volunteer visit www.onerosemountfeedingfamilies.com.

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