'A warm meal every day'
BY FELICIA DECHTER | STAFF WRITER
fdechter@pioneerlocal.com

Good News Kitchen feeds 120 nightly
Sept. 20, 2006

The Good News Community Kitchen is living up to its name.
The Rogers Park organization, 7649 N. Paulina St., is taking a bite out of hunger and poverty while dishing out a hot, nutritious meal to an average of 120 hungry people nightly. The even better news is that staffers are cooking up more, much-needed programs at the nonprofit soup kitchen.
"We're working to provide daily nutritious meals to all people who need them, while building a just society through advocacy...to promote the well-being of our patrons," said organizer Daniel Romero.
According to Romero, the Kitchen started serving up good will in the community about 24 years ago, as the mission of a storefront church--the Good News Community Church--addressing the needs of hungry Rogers Parkers. It originally fed soup and sandwiches a few days a week to neighborhood dwellers north of Howard Street, yet today, it is the highest capacity, free-standing soup kitchen in metropolitan Chicago, and the only one that serves a warm meal every day of the year.

Ten paid staffers of which only two are fulltime and a slew of volunteers hand out meals to 58,000 diners annually. Nightly, an entrée, salad, vegetables, dessert, and bread are served.
"It's the real deal," Romero said, adding that last week, the Kitchen saw a "historic night," when guests were served lobster and crab for no special occasion, courtesy of a Kenilworth congregation.
Yet Romero believes to get to the real root of people's poverty and hunger, "Just feeding them is not enough." He said the Kitchen is "serving more children and families than ever," and sees people from 90 percent of the city's Zip codes and up to a dozen suburbs.
Through partnerships with more than 30 organizations--including churches and synagogues of every denomination--and its 2,500 volunteers, the Kitchen continues to operate, with all funding coming from individuals and foundations, as there is no government money, Romero said.

Monies not only fund dinners, but all the other programs, such as providing hot lunches to about 80 students attending the Howard Area Alternative High School, and supplying after-school snacks for kids at Gale Elementary School and the nearby, private, Starfish Learning Center. It also partners to bring a Produce Mobile to the community, and sponsors a lunch program where kids come for lunch in the summer, Romero said.

Also on the Kitchen's plate is its advocacy component, Northside POWER (People Organized to Work, Educate, and Restore), which is working on community safety, health care, and job training and local jobs campaigns. A North Shore arm of that group was also recently formed. Northside POWER, Romero said, has worked with 24th District Police Comdr. Bruce Rottner to hold undercover drug operations, add more officers of color to the district, and install two blue light cameras. Healthcare is also an issue the Kitchen hopes to sink its teeth into with a Cook County medical clinic in Rogers Park "We have higher than average rates of maladies, including childhood obesity, childhood lead poisoning, diabetes, mental illness, and HIV/AIDS, and other medical problems," Romero said, attributing that to lack of both preventative medical resources and access to medical specialists. "There simply is not the kind of medical resources in the neighborhood for those illnesses require treatment for. "We really feel like we are beginning to make some headway in different issues we're concerned about," Romero added.

For more information call (773) 262-2297.

Daniel Romero, Organizer
Good News Community Kitchen
7649 N. Paulina
Chicago, IL 60626
(773) 262-2297