22 Sunday, March 22, 2020WaTauGa dEMOcraT cOMMunITy
BY KAYLA LASURE
In less than a week, multiple
groups have rallied to help
High Country community
members in the midst of the
COVID-19 pandemic that’s leaving
many temporarily or permanently
without jobs.
“This is such a philanthropic
community,” said Todd Hendley,
a managing partner of Ransom
in Boone. “A lot of places say,
‘we support local,’ but Boone is
different. Everybody in the High Country really genuinely bands
together.”
Taking a “leap of faith,” Hendley
said Ransom is partnering with
Wine to Water and Vincent Prop-
erties in hopes to help local service
workers that were temporarily
laid off. The three businesses have created a project called Care Box,
which prepares boxes of food for
local service industry workers.
Hendley met with Parkway
School Principal Patty Buckner
and Hardin Park social worker
Denise Presnell on March 13.
Hendley said Presnell invited him
to attend a meeting the follow-
ing Monday in which more than
50 community members met to
discuss how they could help others
with the impacts of COVID-19.
After that meeting, Hendley said
he and his brother Doc Hendley
— the president of Wine to Water
— wanted to do something to help.
The two knew they wanted to pack
up food boxes to give to service
workers. Not too long after, the
brothers heard from Vincent
Properties Marketing Director
Shalamar Blevins that they wanted
to partner as well.
Blevins said all three businesses
wants the community to know
that they are there for them, as the
project’s slogan is “serving for our
service industry.”
Care Box received an over-
whelming response of both people
who wanted to help with the proj-
ect and those needing its assis-
tance. Todd Hendley said each box
equates to about 40 meals, mean-
ing at the end of its first week Care Box will have packed 1,600 meals,
he said. According to the leaders,
a household of four people may
need about two boxes of food as
the hope is that a box will last five to seven days for two people.
Each box will have items such as fresh meat, turkey slices, bread,
rice, beans, pasta, fruit, soup,
snacks, peanut butter and jelly.
The boxes will soon include hand
sanitizer, hygiene products and
baby care items, according to the
group.
What started as a plan to create
a possible 150 boxes of food quick-
ly grew to a goal of 400 boxes.
The need grew after the group
reached out to a multitude of
area businesses to ask how many
boxes they would need for their
staff. Hendley said roughly 320 vouchers will be given to people to
receive food boxes.
To inquire about receiving food
from Care Box, service workers
should contact their employer to
connect with the group’s organiz-
ers. Pickup for the boxes will be
every Thursday and Friday from 1
to 6 p.m.
“Boxes are first come, first serve while supplies last, but we will be
doing our best to make sure every-
one is fed,” the group
stated.
Word quickly
spread about
Care Box, and
Hendley said
some community
members have
already donated
money to the proj-
ect by visiting give.
winetowater.org/
CAREBOX. Money for the project
goes to Wine to Water, which
gives 100 percent of the proceeds
to the project, Hendley said.
Volunteers have also started to
just show up at Ransom to join an
assembly line to pack boxes, he
added. Volunteers who are willing
and healthy are welcome, the
group stated. For more informa-
tion about Care Box, contact care.
“Just to see the community
band together, the restaurant
owners and managers looking out
for their teams, the volunteers
showing up and people giving
their hard-earned money to
donate to this cause — it’s insane,”
Hendley said. “It’s exciting, but
more than that it’s incredibly
humbling knowing that we live in
a community that genuinely cares
about everybody.”
Hendley said he has also been
in contact with Travis Reyes — a
service worker at The Cardinal in
Boone. Reyes has been instrumen-
tal in the creation of a local service
workers coalition. The coalition
has posted several resources to aid
service workers on Instagram,
and can be found by
following @booneser-
viceworkerscoalition.
Virtual Tip JarMark Nunes, an Appalachian
State University employee, also
wanted to help service workers by
recently creating a “virtual tip jar.”
Nunes explained that the idea of
a virtual tip jar is popping up in
other communities that are also
experiencing restaurant and bar
closures due to COVID-19. The
virtual tip jar gives the community
a way to provide direct support to
local service workers by use of a
Google sheet.
The Google sheet that Nunes
has created allows local service
workers to list their name, the
restaurant for which they work
and an online payment meth-
od such as Venmo or PayPal.
Community members can visit the
Google sheet and find the name and virtual payment system of
a server who they would like to
support. As of March 19, 64 local
service workers had signed up
to be part of the virtual tip hat,
community offers ways to help neighbors through cOVId-19 crisis
PHOTO BY KAYLA LASURE
Jordan Rowan sets
down a box of food
to help community
members in need.
Boone steps up
SEE HELP ON PAGE 23
COMMUNITY FOOD
PICKUP LOCATIONS
• Boone UMC: Hot meals to go and food boxes from 5-6:30 p.m. on Thursdays.
• FaithBridge: Hot meals to go from 11 a.m.-1 p.m. on Wednesdays and Thursdays. Food boxes from 10:30 a.m.-3 p.m. Thursdays. Families can get food boxes twice a month.
• Hardin Park School: Food boxes from 11 a.m.- 1 p.m. on Mon-days. To go dinner and breakfast for the next day provided from 4-6 p.m. Monday through Friday.
• High Country United Church of Christ: Food boxes
10:30 a.m.-1 p.m. on Mondays and 5:15-7 p.m. on Saturdays.
• Mount Vernon Baptist Church: Food boxes 4-5:30 p.m. on Tuesdays.
• Parkway Elementary School: Food boxes. 11 a.m.- 1 p.m. on Tuesdays.
• TheHeart: Food boxes 1-4 p.m. on Wednesdays.
• The Rock: Food boxes from 5-7 p.m. Wednesday and Sundays.
• Valle Crucis School: Food boxes 11 a.m.-1 p.m. on Wednes-days.
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