YAKIMA, Wash.- Over 200 families crossed off their Thanksgiving shopping lists through DoorDash. Not on the app, but in a donation giveaway at Mount Hope Baptist Church.
2024 is the third year the food delivery company has distributed holiday food in Washington. The event started in the big cities of Seattle and Spokane but has been hosted in Central Washington the last two years, with Pasco getting food in 2023.
Families driving through to get their food didn’t only see DoorDash’s familiar red bags, but elected officials including Yakima Mayor Patricia Byers, Yakima County Commissioner Kyle Curtis and Senator Curtis King.
“It shows the importance of partnerships,” says Curtis. “Not only in your local municipals and county and state government, but to have DoorDash partnering with the Baptist church is a really important partnership. It goes a long way.”
DoorDash worked to find a city that would benefit from donated holiday meals. Mayor Byers says that Yakima well-earned the donations.
“We have a highly impoverished population compared to other parts of the state,” says the mayor. “The fact that they would that they would recognize Yakima, and people will hear about it and think not poor us, but wonderful us. Blessed us, good us. We have all of this going on to serve the people in our community.”
A team of volunteers from Mount Hope and the General Baptist Convention of the Northwest helped throughout the event handing bags over and checking people in. GBCNW President Garry Tyson says it’s part of the season to give back.
“This is the Thanksgiving season,” he says. “The Bible says, ‘Give thanks unto the Lord’ and it’s very difficult as a Christian to sit down and have a meal and not care about your fellow man who may not have a meal.”
DoorDash says its giveaway tradition will continue in 2025, with the location still being decided. The city is likely to be another that comes together in their times of need.
“In Yakima, I’ve noticed that this is a community that really comes together to support one another,” says Kierra Phifer, DoorDash’s Northwest Public Engagement Manager. “We’re thrilled to be able to join in that community and join in that partnership so we can all support each other during the holiday season.”
