Jeff Parker is a cofounder of Amarillo Brown Bag Runs, an organization that feeds people for free in Amarillo, Texas.
How did you get involved with feeding people?
Well actually a friend of mine who was from the little town in Texas I grew up in, he was homeless in LA , you know a drug junkie. He got out and got saved somehow. He made it out and was going around just giving sandwiches to people. I got involved through him and realized I loved it and we founded a charity together. I was on the original board and we were doing 150 meals a day. We still give food out every day. It can be up to 200 but it’s usually 75 to 100 meals a day.
That’s amazing. You at first were financing it on your own?
I was prepping sandwiches, just 10 or 15 sandwiches, we were funding it ourselves, but as we got more volunteers, we had 100 at one point … Covid kind of killed it and now there’s just a little group of us. People gave money and it all went to the food. With Covid it dried up and we just fund it ourselves. I make sandwiches three days a week and we just buy our own supplies. We’ve somehow kept it going.
How do you distribute the stuff? Do you just go out in the street or they just come to you?
Oh yeah. We go out there. We built a little system. I have a house downtown. We run it out of our house basically. Amarillo’s a small place but we’re at a central location. One person preps the food and coolers here at the house and someone separate distributes. It’s usually the founder, Kip.
There’s no transaction. They don’t’ have to listen to a prayer or sermon. They just take the food. We’d rather them throw it in the trash can than have to look in the trash can for food.
There are a group of people out there trying to count the homeless, like trying to herd cats, but in 2023 it was over 700 homeless people. For our town our size it’s quite a few.
I remember reading that a few years ago there was a tent city outside of city hall.
As far as the tent cities, a few years ago they found an old statute that made camping illegal, even on private land, they’d try to fine homeless people $2000. They were trying to criminalize being poor, our city government. All the groups got together. We started camping on the city hall steps. Our founder got arrested. We were sleeping out there – I went to get food and he got arrested! They finally backed down. That was 2018 I think. A lot of people were upset. Tent cities aren’t the answer. We don’t’ have low barrier shelters. If you have an addiction or a behavioral issue or a pet there’s nowhere for you to stay here.
I always believed the stories about the homeless, but when you get out and talk to them it’s not all drug addiction. Mental illness – if you’re not mentally ill when you become homeless you’ll suffer some form of mental illness before long.
Just the trauma, being on the street, negative experiences are almost assured.
Oh yeah. I couldn’t believe how many people were victims of domestic and child abuse and even old people with medical emergencies they can’t afford. There are hundreds of reasons why people are homeless. Once your homeless it’s also very hard to become not homeless. If you don’t have an ID or an address you can’t get a job or housing.
I’ve worked with chronically homeless people and even in a city like New York where the benefits are above and beyond it’s hard for people to get connected with the system and then toe the line.
Being in a Salvation Army is no joke. I’d have behavioral issues too if I was forced into that situation and had to go by the rules or be separated from my animals . . . that’s a huge deal people don’t want to be separated from their animals and can’t go into a shelter.
They were trying to push people from downtown where all the resources are. I can’t wrap my mind around how much it costs taxpayers for homeless to be on the streets. It’s more expensive than it is to incarcerate someone in Texas. When you factor in their extended hospital stays, police calls. I’m not advocating to put them in prison cause it’s cheaper!
Well, someone might be. The relationship between prison and homelessness and mental illness is really complicated. I used to work in prison and there were a lot of people who would get incarcerated on purpose just to have somewhere to stay during the winter. If you don’t want to sleep on the subway train or street every night maybe you figure out a crime to commit that doesn’t hurt anyone that gets you some shelter. It’s a strategy.
Well and Covid comes along and homeless people don’t just go away. The numbers have jumped up actually. We used to have teams of people out feeding and then we had to slow it way down just for safety. We haven’t had many other safety issues trying to get food to people. It’s a small town and you get to know people. There are some really unique people.
We do have a great housing organization (Amarillo Housing First) that welcomes anyone when it gets below freezing. I haven’t heard of anyone freezing to death since they opened. But I wish we had a permanent low barrier shelter.
The one concern seems to be getting people away from downtown.
The optics.
It might scare away the tourists that are flocking to Texas. Haha.
What do you usually serve?
Lots people peanut butter and jelly. Ham and cheese. Turkey and cheese. Lots of people do brisket here so occasionally we’ll get that. My family and I used to do beans and rice. We’d make 200 servings of beans and rice. We’d have roasters in every room of the house. We got crazy with it. That’s when we had a lot of volunteers.
That reminds me of the Hare Krishnas in Tomkins Square Park with their cauldrons of soup.
I was trying to do research on Sun Ra’s moon stew. I’ve written Marshall Allen letters. I send a donation every once in a while to the Sun Ra Arkestra. What have you been listening to?
Recently, some Texas fiddle contest compilations actually.
Eck Robertson (famous Texas fiddler) is buried about ten feet from my father. When I visit my father’s grave I always pour a little whiskey on Eck’s grave.
You should come here during Bob Wills Day in Turkey, Texas. Every year it’s fewer and fewer Playboys. They’re all on oxygen. They have crazy fiddle competitions with old people just coming from the woods. It’s fun. I used to always see Leon Rausch there. It’s a big old celebration. The local high school selling fried pies. Last time I went there was a drone flying nearby and it caused a major uproar. Some of the Playboys were about to shoot down the drone.
Is your wife ok with your deep involvement in this sandwich operation?
Oh yeah. It was kind of hard to explain at first, but during Covid her whole family would come over and help make the soups and hot meals. I like cooking. To me, making sandwiches is like meditation. I love it. I plan on doing it forever. There are times when we feel like we’re not going to be able to do it but it always works out. We all made a vow that no matter what we’re going to feed people.
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