Backpacks for Persons Experiencing Homelessness | East Ridge Community Food Pantry

Carolyn Tucker is the Director of the East Ridge Community Food Pantry. Their mission is to tackle food insecurity by giving away food to people in need on the 1st & 3rd Wednesday of each month. They also serve the people of East Ridge who are within walking distance and experiencing homelessness. Homelessness is a major issue in our city. Several people experiencing homelessness have reported to Carolyn the food they receive from the pantry gets stolen. The backpacks will make it easier to carry their food and protect it from others. Our $3,000 grant will go to 100+ backpacks with hygiene products, food and other items like can openers, eating utensils etc.

Youth Programming | Chattanooga Girls Rock

Chattanooga Girls Rock! exists to empower girls, trans and nonbinary youth in our community to build confidence and celebrate their individuality through collaborative music education, social justice and performance. Their summer camp is a huge success and highly coveted. They listen to their campers and their parents, turns out they want more programming throughout the year. Enter our $3,000 grant.

More classes, workshops and hugs. Partnering with The Chattery they are able to offer classes like The Birds and The Bees and Consent and Bodily Autonomy, amongst others taught by Kelly Quinn. And a three part poetry workshop with the wise and talented Erika Roberts. While music is the usual CGR medium, this additional programming aims to help provide our youth with the platform and tools they need to tell their own stories and be heard. Word.

1701 Dodson Furniture | Chattanooga Free Store

The Chattanooga Free Store is a non-religious, volunteer run, mutual aid coalition. Their core belief is that everyone deserves to live well, and to be able to meet their basic needs. They believe the solution to hunger, poverty, and other material inequality, is for communities to build their own systems and structures to care for each other. Communities, neighborhoods, and families know better than anyone what they need, and we believe in bringing them to the table and putting the resources we have directly in their hands. And they’ve been doing exactly that.

2022 brings them into their own physical space at 1701 Dodson Ave. All they needed was some furniture like clothing racks, storage and folding chairs. That’s where our $1,400 came in handy. If you would like to donate to support their efforts, volunteer, or find other information, go to linktr.ee/chattfreestore to find all the links you need!

Teaching Apiary | Nooga Queen Bee

We all love pollinators, right? Nooga Queen Bee (NQB) is a new non-profit dedicated to bringing education and experience about beekeeping to women and minority Chattanoogans. And it’s doing it through a piece of property in Red Bank (yes, Red Bank is Chattanooga too) and on YouTube so anyone can access content. Why did NQB come about? Well, did you know beekeeping is a male dominated field? Founder, Carmen Joyce, wanted to provide a space designed to overcome barriers to entry in the field through outreach and education. Carmen also outline that beekeeping can be a road to personal growth and enrichment and in practical terms it can become a way to sustain oneself through lucrative work whether it be honey sales, nuc sales, mentorship, or queen rearing. It will provide a space for female/minority beekeepers to learn and grow, become mentors, and gain confidence in the field.

How are we helping? $1,600 from our December 2021 grant pool will buy necessities like frames, smokers and gloves amongst much more.

BHM Book Giveaway | Culture Books

If you’ve not met Erica Richardson, founder of Culture Books, you’re missing out. Not only is she passionate about putting books with culturally diverse characters into the hands of children of color, she’s also a librarian at the Avondale YFD Center who can turn any frown upside down. She’s magic, y’all.

Our $3,000 grant went to purchase books like “The 1619 Project: Born on the Water” and “The Story of Rap” that are based on Black History Month and/or written by Black Authors. Books were distributed to kids at several schools with predominantly black and brown youth like Woodmore Elementary. Kids will have books in their homes that have representation of them, their ancestry and Black History Month in general. The kids were so excited to get books that they could keep forever. This is exactly what books should do for kids, right?

Restorative Practices Documentary | CALEB

We’ve all heard of the the school-to-prison pipeline, right? For low-income and minority communities expulsions and suspensions are one of the key contributors. Data from the Tennessee Department of Education and Hamilton County Schools (HCS) indicates that black students are four times more likely to receive suspensions than white students. In 2019, HCS was reprimanded by the state's education department for inequitable disciplinary treatment of minority students and those with disabilities. These facts speak to the need for discipline reform in HCS. So how?

CALEB is creating a documentary to show school board members, educators and staff how the use of restorative practices reduce the numbers of behavior referrals leading to suspensions and expulsions. Who is CALEB, anyway? CALEB is an institutional coalition of faith-based, labor, and community groups working to build power to affect change in Chattanooga.

Our $3,000 grant will be used for two dinner/documentary viewing parties showcasing restorative practices at Orchard Knob Elementary School. The two schools will be in Hamilton County school zones where “out of classroom” times (suspensions, expulsions, juvenile court referrals, etc.) are prevalent.

Binders for Kids | B4CK

B4CK stands for Binders for Confident Kids. What is a binder? It is a chest compression garment designed to give the appearance of a flat chest. Binders help queer youth feel safe, focus on learning and stay alive. Really.

A national survey by GLSEN has found that 75% of transgender youth feel unsafe at school, and those who are able to persevere had significantly lower GPAs, were more likely to miss school out of concern for their safety, and were less likely to plan on continuing their education. More than half of transgender male teens who participated in the survey reported attempting suicide in their lifetime and many transgender young people experience family rejection, bullying and harassment, or feel unsafe for simply being who they are - all of which can be added risk factors for suicide.

So, how did we help? $515 went to purchase and distribute binders, based on need, for Chattanooga queer youth.

Operation Warm | Rainbow at Ridgeway

Winter officially started on December 21st. While you probably have a nice warm winter coat and boots, not everyone does. Enter Lindsey Butler, the Resident Services Coordinator for Rainbow Housing Assistance Corporation at Ridgeway Apartments on the west side of Chattanooga. She saw a need and had the right partners to make it happen. Our $2,485 grant purchased 62 coats and 53 pairs of shoes for children who reside in the Ridgeway community through Operation Warm. They partner with community organizations such as Rainbow to use this gift (the coats and shoes are a really good deal) as a catalyst for community connection.

But that’s not all Lindsey wanted to accomplish. After receiving the items, kids were asked to write a letter to a child at St. Jude's spending the holidays in the hospital. Paying it forward as they say. Nice job, Lindsey.