Organizations are preparing for Thanksgiving and Christmas, collecting food for regular and special food bank distributions, putting out calls for desserts and other items for community meals, recruiting event volunteers, and planning effective outreach and engagement.
Policy on the #NNK wants to help. We will gather and share information here on the blog and broadcast on our Facebook and Instagram channels as well as share in several subreddits, such as r/NorthernNeck , r/EastVirginia, and r/Virginia. Specifically, we will:
- Create a new page, Holiday food and meals, Oct. - Dec. 2026; it will be home to holiday food-related information. The page will be updated as needed.
- Encourage the public to sign up for emails announcing food and volunteer events. Emails will be sent October - December. The sign up list is confidential and will not be shared.
- Contact houses of faith listed in (Crowdsourced) Outreach and Assets on the NNK and ask for their plans to help community members, deets about volunteer opportunities, and donation details.
- Encourage organizations and individuals to distribute information in ways that will reach those they want to serve. This can include other organizations, posting flyers (see the Physical tab in (Crowdsourced) Outreach and Assets on the NNK), submitting event information to media outlets (radio, newspaper), having members share information with their network, and consistently and regularly sharing info on social media (meaning one time is not enough).
- Promote voluntarism. An example is Non-Perishable Sorting at Healthy Harvest Food Bank.
- Encourage the use of a free graphic design service like Canva and not generative AI to design flyers and art for social media. There are many reasons AI is not the best option, not least is that AI-created flyers have a similar look and feel. The similarity makes users do the work of differentiating. This is not a good use of the public’s time.
Why we are doing this: We, well, I (Susie Cambria), believe we can do more for more people by coordinating, collaborating, and individually and collectively working more efficiently.
Have questions? Email me.
