The yearly meal hosted by Southern Oregon Jobs with Justice continues to grow

By Meg Wade for Ashland.news

Eighty volunteers came together to cook, serve, and deliver approximately 300 meals at the 10th annual Thanksgiving Community Peace Meal on Thursday. The event is put on by Southern Oregon Jobs with Justice (SOJWJ), co-sponsored by the Mountain Meadows Community Foundation and the Ashland Lions Club, and hosted at the First Presbyterian Church of Ashland.

“I want to acknowledge the strength and resilience it takes to navigate the world these days,” said Jason Houk of SOJWJ as the meal opened. “This is love in action, what we’re seeing here today.”

This year’s was the largest meal by far, said Peace Meal coordinator Vanessa Houk. The number of deliveries was double that of last year, she reported. Delivered meals are taken by volunteers after the main meal service to those unable to leave their home or who lack transportation.

Such deliveries are in addition to meals taken to-go. Tona Klote, who works as a caregiver, left First Presbyterian’s Calvin Hall juggling multiple to-go containers she had filled to take to a client.

“The fellow I work for can’t get out of his house, and doesn’t really have any food. He’s older, with disabilities,” she explained. Klote was taking food for the two of them, so they could eat together and enjoy one another’s company.

Enjoying the company of community was a key reason many volunteers and attendees both gave for coming to the meal.

“We want to come here and let people have the experience we do on Thanksgiving,” said Issa Wren-Culhane, age 12, who was volunteering with other members of her family.

“It was really fun,” she added. “I’m happy to see everyone together.”

“It’s a blessing to the people that prepare the food, as well as to the people who come to eat,” said Glenn Battin. While his own disabilities didn’t prevent him from making it to the meal, Battin said they did prevent him from getting out too often, or in traveling out of state to see family. The socializing on the holiday was important for him.

Many volunteers likewise have family members who have passed on or are no longer able to gather, and the meal provides a source of comfort and connection on a day that might otherwise be spent alone.

“My family’s all gone. When the holidays come around I have two choices: I can either wallow in self-pity or I can rise above and fill my spirit by helping,” said Marc Bayliss, who has been volunteering each Thanksgiving for the last seven years.

Bayliss, president of the Rotary Club of Medford, was greeting attendees at the door alongside Lisa Dunagan from the Rotary Club of Ashland.

“It keeps me out of trouble,” Dunagan said, since her kids have grown and moved away. Dunagan also cited the recent federal shutdown and disruption in SNAP benefits as a motivation to get out and help.

For others, volunteering at the meal with their adult children was a way to pass on a tradition. Louisa Reed and her son Max, 22, were serving coffee, tea, and hot chocolate outside the front doors. Reed said she served at a community meal in San Francisco when she was in her early 20s.

“It was my favorite thing to do. I’d get there at four in the morning and there was so much food!” she said.

“I enjoy doing the coffee station,” Max said. He also took a turn on the church’s piano later in the morning, providing music for the dining room.

Some come to share time with family members while they eat. Dana Walker, 72, came to the meal with his daughter Metiyah, 47, who lives in Ashland.

“It’s one of the best meals I have all year,” said Walker, who lives in a converted school bus and splits his time between the Rogue Valley in the winter and the coast in the summer. Walker lamented laws that restrict low-cost living arrangements like his. 

“I’ve solved the affordable housing crisis for myself,” he said. “I wish I didn’t have to play hide-and-seek with the police.”

Many of those who attended at the Peace Meal lack regular housing. Concern about the cold weather over the holiday weekend was a clear concern for some, as the opening date for the severe weather shelter at 2200 Ashland St. was pushed back to Dec. 5. During the meal, Jason Houk made sure to share the details on the emergency shelter run by OHRA, which is scheduled to be open from 5 p.m. in the evening to 9 a.m. the next morning from Friday, Nov. 28, to 9 a.m. Monday, Dec. 1.

The Peace Meal has its origin in the Houks’ own experience with losing housing, Vanessa Houk told Ashland.news on Thursday after she was finally able to take a minute away from coordination duties as the meal began to wind down. The Houks lost their home in 2020 in the Almeda Fire.

That experience changed her relationship to accepting help from others.

“It really hit home, needing help, feeling so vulnerable,” she shared. “But we saw the community surround us.”

“Sometimes we have to accept help, sometimes we give,” she said. “In a culture that is built around doing it yourself, it can be impossible to ask for the help you need. But there’s a whole circle there.”

SOJWJ serves community meals year-round at 3:30 p.m. Thursdays and Fridays at the gazebo in Lithia Park. While they often have a surfeit of volunteers on Thanksgiving, they often need more help at these regular meals, which serve around 70 people each day.

“We have 80 people today. But tomorrow, it might be just Jason and me,” Houk said.

Those who would like to help can do so in a variety of ways, including just cooking food to drop off, or coming to the meal to serve. To get involved, community members can call or text Jason at 541-841-8341, or email jason@sojwj.org.

Houk encouraged anyone who might be interested to reach out.

“There’s so much in the world that hurts and that’s wrong and that I wish I could fix or help,” she said, “and I don’t know how to do that. But I know how to make a pot of soup, right? I can start there.”

Email Ashland resident and freelance journalist Meg Wade at news@megwade.net.