Dwight Taylor Food Giveaway Feeds Dozens of Hungry Central Floridians

Karsceal Turner – I Got Next!

Various organizations participated in the effort, including members of Alpha Kappa Alpha, sorority, Inc., Beta Sigma Phi, Fraternity, Inc., Boaz Lodge #212, F&AM P.H.A., Farm Share, University of Central Florida, regional campus at Daytona State College, and Serenity Chapter #118, Order of the Eastern Star.

The Food Give-away was presented by State Representative Dwayne L. Taylor and was held Saturday, May 30^th from 10:00am until 1:00pm in the atrium of the UCF building on Daytona State’s campus located at 1200 International Speedway Blvd.

Although the giveaway began at 10:00, volunteers arrived by 8:00am to begin staging, bagging, and boxing food items, which included various fresh produce items such as squash, potatoes, egg plants, gallon jugs of sweat tea, and watermelons.

Farm Share

Established in 1991, Farm Share is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, dedicated to recovering, sorting, packing and distributing nutritious food for people in need. Farm Share administers a combination of USDA commodity programs and produce recovery operations. The organization and its volunteers re-sort and package an abundance of surplus food and distributes it to individuals, soup kitchens, homeless shelters, churches, and other organizations feeding the hungry in Florida — free of charge.

This is the second year Representative Taylor has spearheaded the effort. As word spread throughout Daytona Beach and surrounding areas, a line formed and snaked through the Daytona State parking lot out of the parking lot, then down the street and around the corner.

Why waste good produce?

Here’s some trivia for you I lifted from Farm Shares page. “Half of every crop harvested is thrown away. If a farmer grows 100,000 pounds of tomatoes, usually about half of them must be thrown away. If a tomato is slightly misshapen, discolored, too small, too big or blemished in any way, it will not meet the consumer demand for a “perfect” tomato and will be rejected. This is true for many fruit and vegetable crops. To prevent trucks of produce from being rejected, crops are “culled” (hand sorted) after they are picked. About half goes into the truck on its way to the store. The other half goes into the truck going to the dump, or destined to be plowed under and sprayed with insecticide. The food being thrown is perfectly nutritious. Instead of dumping, farmers donate this food to Farm Share to help feed the hungry.

We really should show more love to the farmers, without them we might really be in trouble. I’d invite the readers of this column to learn to grow their own veggies. I’m just saying, it can be done. But I digress.

Humanitarian efforts run in the family

D’armon Beckton, and his wife, Erin were among those involved in the humanitarian effort. Beckton, 38 is a Daytona Beach native and also is C.O.O of MaddZoo, a business start-up company. We’ll hit on that another time. However, he described the feeling of being of assistance to his neighbors during the food giveaway.

“I love it! It is a great concept, we didn’t realize the magnitude of how it would be at first,” Beckton exclaimed. “We’ve seen a steady growth, at first didn’t feed as many families as we wanted to. This year I’d estimate we served 400 to 450 families, the people really came out once the word got out,” he said.

Beckton was situated at the last station where those being served were given watermelons and sweet tea, just in time for the Florida Summer heat.

A few feet away, his identical twin brother, Damien, the younger of the Beckton twins(by eight minutes), could be seen packing car trunks and truck beds with fresh produce while retaining his humor in the midst of dealing with the long line of recipients. Damien’s wife Lashanya assisted with greeting and registering the people lined up to receive food items.

“It was a total family effort. It’s about giving back and we’ll certainly be back next,” Beckton said. The younger twin chimed in “This was a wonderful experience to be involved in, the people that volunteered were awesome, and the people were very grateful for the groceries. Everyone thanked God for us and the event,” he said.

Social and civic organizations jump in the effort

Members of local fraternities and sororities were also involved in the food giveaway. Organization involved included representatives from Alpha Phi Alpha, Kappa Alpha Psi, Phi Beta Sigma, Alpha Kappa Alpha, Delta Sigma Theta, and Beta Sigma Phi, Boaz Lodge #212, and Serenity Chapter #118 O.E.S.

Worthy Matron Maria McCoy was impressed with the number of people who took advantage of the giveaway and was happy to assist in loading cars as they came through venue.

“It was a fun experience. It was nice to see so many people from various organizations working together to feed the families. There was so much food to give also. Serenity had a good showing with at least 8 members and 1 soon to be member there working. I’m proud of us and how we stepped up to help,” McCoy said.

Likewise, Worshipful Master Donald R. Jordan of Boaz Lodge #212 was alongside McCoy putting in work and loading cars and trucks during the giveaway. By the time the effort ended, all volunteers completed a vigorous cardio workout.

“It’s a beautiful thing when we can come together to assist our fellow man. Programs like these are much needed and I applaud our State Representative in the effort, I am happy we were asked to be involved. The brothers jumped at the chance to help out. Since our sisters of the O.E.S. showed up in numbers too. It was truly a family effort on behalf of the PHA masonic family here in Daytona Beach,” Jordan remarked.