In a season of extreme need, some mutual aid groups are flourishing. Others are sinking under the weight.
Giving and volunteerism ebb and crest with pandemic fatigue, civil unrest, and the weather.
In April, Jena Harris and Katie Briggs ventured into two West Philadelphia parks to give out free produce and pints of homemade soup. The two friends, both freelance chefs and food activists, weren’t sure what to expect.
Pictured above: Volunteers with the West Philly Bunny Hop pack produce shares at the group’s warehouse space in Yeadon, PA.
But people came, masked and gloved, to the distribution sites in the Cedar Park and Cobbs Creek neighborhoods, where gentrification has displaced longtime residents and exacerbated inequality. Soon all the soup was gone. Harris and Briggs did it the next week and the next, adding rolls of toilet paper, hand sanitizer, and bottles of bleach procured from restaurant-supply stores when supermarket shelves were empty.