MEMPHIS, Tenn. (localmemphis.com) – UPDATE: 11/5/2019: The City of Memphis says it has been “overwhelmed with the outpouring of generosity from so many who have reached out and want to help continue the tradition of the Thanksgiving Dinner for the Homeless and Hungry.” Now city leaders are in the process of working on a plan to continue the dinner this year for the Thanksgiving holiday.
The Thanksgiving Dinner for the Homeless and Hungry has always been provided by the Thanksgiving Dinner Committee.
We’re told the plan now is to move the dinner to city hall. More details will be made available soon.
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Thanksgiving is canceled for more than a thousand hungry and homeless people in Memphis.
For 34 years, the Memphis Thanksgiving Dinner for the Homeless and Hungry at the Convention Center fed some of the most vulnerable in the city. Now, those folks will have to go somewhere else for a hot meal on Thanksgiving. One reason it has been suspended is construction.
“We were very, very surprised because last year we were there and were some renovations going on,” said Earl Sayles, the event organizer. “We didn’t think it would be an issue this year.”
Sayles said they were notified about a month ago the facility was not available.
“At the 11th hour we got the call saying we’re just not ready, we can’t do it because of safety reasons and there was just this collective gasp like ‘oh what are we going to do?” said Sayles.
The city of Memphis website said in part: “Unfortunately, organizers felt they didn’t have the finances to move forward with the event.”
According to Sayles, money has always been an issue.
“Funding hadn’t worked, he explained. “We’ve been paying for it our of our pockets.”
The organizer says the city provides the facility and cooks but everything else like food and giveaways, falls on committee members. The committee said no other building had the capacity.
“The enormity of moving one thousand people, a couple of hundred volunteers the meals for a thousand people and the table and chairs for roughly a thousand people just wouldn’t fit neatly anywhere,” shared Sayles.
Now organizers are asking for donations from the public.
“So we can be better prepared if something like this happens again,” commented Sayles.
The Thanksgiving Dinner for the Homeless and Hungry is set to happen at Cook Convention Center next year.
Meanwhile, the Memphis Union Mission is still planning to hold its Thanksgiving dinner November 27th.