The first thing you've got to know about me--all I ever wanted to do was open the greatest nightclub in the world.
At age 12, after watching the movie Casablanca, opening a nightclub was all I thought about, day and night. Much to my Marine Corp pilot father's chagrin, I landed a job at the Childe Harold, a Washington, DC, nightclub, and eventually worked my way up in the business to manage and book bands at several clubs in the city. I was having a great time preparing to use the power of music to take over the world, when, on a night off, I found myself tagging along with my wife, Claudia, and others from a church group to feed people who lived outside, on the streets of DC.
Up until that point in my life, I had admired, but managed (purposely) to avoid, volunteering. . .which is why I still refer to myself as a "recovering hypocrite." There I was talking about changing the world, but I had to be corralled and pushed into helping people in my own backyard.
Going out on a truck (different congregations took turns preparing and serving meals at sites near the White House and World Bank) was an amazing thing, but I was immediately struck by the fact that, while we were doing good, we were doing nothing to help people out of the situations they were in. We were just handing food out a window to folks standing in the rain. . .and all we kept saying was "see you tomorrow?!?!"
I thought to myself, "This group is buying food to give it away, while friends in the catering and restaurant businesses lament the waste of tons of their food everyday." You have to understand, this was the 80s. . .you know, it was shrimp and asparagus, and keep it coming! At the same time, people mistakenly thought that it was illegal, or that they could get sued for giving away food that might make someone sick, so at the end of the day everything ended up in the dumpster.
But while the thought of all that food being tossed irked me. . .I was equally intrigued by the thought that, while foodservice businesses tossed tons of food, they also had tons of jobs. . .and many of the people I served that night looked like they had the potential to do more than wait in line, night after night for free food.
I had to do something. Joining the concepts of doing more to help "homeless" people with using food that was about to be thrown away, I came up with a plan. Excited, I met with church and civic leaders, urging them to pick up food and provide food service training to people on the street who lacked job skills. To my surprise, I was met with blank stares and outright skepticism. No one was interested in a program that took people who were thrown away and food that was thrown away and made something out of them. Recognizing that nobody was going to do this if I didn't, I "temporarily" postponed my career in the nightclub business and started the DC Central Kitchen.
My heart was in the right place, and I had a great plan, but I immediately ran into roadblocks: nobody had done this before, and it was harder than I thought to raise the dough I needed to launch. After months of appealing to numerous would-be donors and grant makers, I finally received a $25,000 grant which allowed me to buy a refrigerator truck. That's how on January 20, 1989, the day George H.W. Bush was inaugurated President of the United States, I officially opened DC Central Kitchen.
Using my show-biz training, I married one high-profile event--the inauguration--with the DC Central Kitchen's genesis, and was able to garner publicity for the concept (while dispelling concerns about legality) and lots of new donations! After that, the Kitchen rapidly began to pick up all sorts of support!
In the past 18 years, working with an amazing team, we have transformed the DC Central Kitchen into a bad ass, $5-million annual operation, which hauls in close to two tons of food per day, converts it into 4,500 meals, which we deliver to partner agencies that serve seniors, kids, people in shelters, and folks in recovery/addiction programs throughout the DC metro area. Since its opening, the Kitchen has distributed over 17 million meals and helped over 620 men and women gain full-time employment. More importantly, we have saved this city and our partners about 30 million bucks that were used to lift people UP and OUT of poverty. Righteous, huh?
The Kitchen has also started Fresh Start, a revenue generating catering/contract food business that hires graduates from the training program and allows us to raise our own scratch, making us less dependent on grants. In addition, we founded the Campus Kitchens Project, which uses kitchens in public schools, colleges, and universities to train students how to prepare food they collect locally, which is then delivered to partner agencies right near campus.
In my travels I can see, like many of you, that our nation faces challenging issues in the not to distant future. Issues that, I believe, will demand more coordination and cooperation from nonprofits in communities from coast to coast--issues that will also demand a greater understanding of our social and economic potential. We have to move beyond the notion of simple charity and recognize that our resources must be maximized, our results measured and our methods modernized. In EVERY town, in EVERY state, nonprofits, volunteers, donors and the people we serve must begin to stand together and work for something much, much different--real change. I am beyond ready to face this new challenge. I hope you will join me!
