Thanksgiving is not just about feasting; it’s a day of charity. Yet 22 US cities have blocked nonprofits from offering food to the homeless in public spaces. Why?

For a lot of people in the United States, Thanksgiving includes volunteering: either filling up a bag of non-perishable food items for a food drive, or volunteering, or sending donations to food banks or hunger charities like Feeding America. If you haven’t, you certainly know someone who has.

And yet a growing array of communities seem intent on making it harder for many of these organizations to serve the still-high homeless population in cities across the United States.

In the US, 21 cities have managed to pass legislation banning or restricting organizations from sharing food with homeless populations in public places since January 2013 alone, according to a recent report by the National Coalition for the Homeless.

Make that 22 cities: Since that report was published, Fort Lauderdale, Florida passed an ordinance that effectively makes it impossible for charity groups to keep serving food to homeless populations outdoors and in parks.

The new rules, ostensibly to protect those getting the food from any illnesses from poorly prepared foods, require charity groups that distribute food to comply with the same standards of a restaurant dishing up meals for tourists visiting Fort Lauderdale’s beaches. That doesn’t just mean wearing gloves; it includes providing toilets and an array of specific equipment.

What could be the motivation? As commissioners acknowledged in the ordinance, “the City of Fort Lauderdale has a substantial interest in the revitalization, preservation of property values and the prevention of the deterioration in its downtown.”

And feeding the homeless – which destroys the visual impression of a booming downtown – kind of wrecks that image.

Of course, Fort Lauderdale’s enforcement hasn’t done a great job for the city’s image, either.

Among those whom the city’s police arrested for violating the new rules was a 90-year-old volunteer, Arnold Abbott, ordering him to “drop that plate right now”. Abbott and others now face 60 days in jail and a $500 fine.

This is happening in cities like Raleigh, North Carolina, that go to great lengths to show compassion for the homeless.

Raleigh rallies behind year-round food bank fundraising efforts. In an area where even colleges and universities have had to add food pantries to help their students and adjunct professors make ends meet, corporations eagerly organized turkey drives to benefit the local food banks. Its community activists and politicians are debating what to do about the problem of “food deserts” – neighborhoods with no access to grocery stories with fresh, affordable food.

And in spite of all that community spirit, Raleigh has made it a lot tougher for organizations feeding the homeless. Nonprofits can feed the homeless from public parks – only if they obtain a permit that costs $800 a day.

Some groups and city officials have found ways to work together, such as Dining with Dignity in St Augustine, Florida. Other organizations have combined their direct missions of feeding the hungry with creative advocacy efforts, attempting to do everything from convincing cities and states to adopt a homeless bill of rights (in place in Illinois and Rhode Island) or extend anti-discrimination laws to cover the homeless, to boost federal funding for various food and nutrition programs.



If you’re feeling truly ambitious, you could even launch an effort to have your community recognized as a “compassionate city”. These include Seattle, whose mayor, for Thanksgiving, just ceremonially pardoned not the traditional Turkeys, but two packages of Tofurky, “to draw attention to hunger in the community”.

The destination of the Tofurky? Local food banks, of course.