PINECREST, Fla. – The PORCH story begins some 700 miles away in Christine Cotton’s North Carolina home. Her son Matthew asked her to make sandwiches for a classmate who didn’t have enough food to eat.
“To this day it still touches me, because these boys were able to troubleshoot something and I felt as the adult I had a pulse on my community and at that moment I knew I didn’t,” said Cotton, who’s the founder & director of PORCH Communities. “I didn’t know how much hunger there was.”
The experience led Cotton to start a food collection with her friends. As more volunteers joined in, the nonprofit was founded and a simple operational model was adopted.
“People want to help, sometimes they don’t know how to help,” said Cotton. “They don’t know where a pantry is. They don’t know what the pantry needs. So, we took those barriers down, and we’ll tell you what the pantry needs. We will pick it up for you and we will bring it to the pantry.”
Today, PORCH Communities is flourishing in 11 states with 50 chapters, including the PORCH Pinecrest chapter in South Florida.
Each month, PORCH Pinecrest volunteers drive to the homes of neighbors who signed up online and pledged to contribute groceries. Sunita Mookergee is a proud PORCH Pinecrest volunteer and monthly donor.
“Ideally, we would like that we would not need a food pantry, but having seen the reality of it, we want to make sure that children have access to healthy food so then they could have good lives, healthy lives,” said Mookergee, who’s also a public health professional.
Pinecrest Vice Mayor Shannon del Prado gives toward the effort and is delighted to see her constituents involved.
“When you volunteer you make a decision about the kind of community you want to live in,” said del Prado. “And when you do good for others, it makes them feel good, too.”
After visiting 13 homes and businesses, PORCH Pinecrest volunteers collected 1,500 pounds of food. They brought the items in their vehicles to the Pinecrest Community Center, where The Publix Good Together truck was stationed. The truck was loaded with all the food before heading to Miami Southridge High School.
Upon arrival, students were on hand ready to unload and stock more than 7,000 pounds of food. The 1,500 from PORCH and an additional 6,000 pounds, amounting to more than $8,000, were donated by our Food for Thought partners at Publix.
“Many students get their first meal right here at school,” said Publix Community Relations Manager Robyn Hankerson Printemps. “So these products they’ll be able to take home and ensure that not only they can have food, but also their siblings, their parents and maybe others in the community as well.”
Maylen Tolsa is a senior at Miami Southridge High School who helps run the school’s food pantry.
“You have your own situation going on at home and you really don’t know what anyone else is going through,” said Tolsen. “So, when you see those kids come in and they come in discreetly, and they don’t want to be noticed, and we get to help them.”
And this help was made possible by a mom who listened to her young son and decided to make a difference that defied distance.
“Truly our vision is to have PORCHES all around Miami,” said Cotton. “There’s no reason why we can’t, and beyond Miami, and through Florida and through the rest of the country. It’s just one PORCH at a time.”
To find out more about PORCH Communities, including how to start a chapter in your neighborhood, visit porchcommunities.org.