What started out with the feeding of about 20 families on a street corner in Port Arthur more than a decade ago turned to a massive meal giveaway where more than 300 families were fed recently.

Charlotte’s Cupboard, headed by Charlotte Moses of Christian Faith Missionary Baptist Church, recently helped upwards of 800 individuals with a Thanksgiving meal during a drive-thru food pantry.

She’s come a long way since those early days.

Volunteers from the church were joined by non-profit partners such as Hope Crisis Center, Gulf Coast Community Health Center, the Mexican Heritage Society royalty, and the Rape and Suicide Crisis Center.

Charlotte’s Cupboard was one of 18 local nonprofit organizations that received grants from the Port Arthur LNG Season of Giving initiative a few weeks ago. PA LNG’s engineering, procurement and construction contractor Bechtel also pitched in to assist the organizations.

Some background

The feeling of helping others means everything to Moses and husband, Pastor Albert Moses.

“I started out with feeding about 20 families at the corner of Savannah and Seventh Street. I had a heart for feeding people,” Moses said. I started cooking meals and feeding on Thanksgiving Day. I made sure people had a Thanksgiving meal and were able to serve from there.”

The feedback was positive and she realized the impact this gesture made.

She felt she needed to do more and Charlotte’s Cupboard was born. This was a food pantry on a larger scale than the Thanksgiving meal.

She started out giving out about 25 bags of food given by church members. By 2014 the cupboard became a 501c3 nonprofit and she partnered with the Southeast Texas Food Bank.

She went from giving out 50 bags of food to upwards of 300 bags during the Thanksgiving giveaway.

Charlotte’s Cupboard holds a drive-thru pantry on the third Friday of the month from 4 to 6 p.m. and the third Saturday from 9 a.m. to noon or until supplies are gone. Patrons can only attend to one of the two days per month.

Meaningful

“We are making sure people are not hungry,” Moses said. It doesn’t matter if the person has qualified for other assistance or not.

The grant, she said, means they can feed more people those freeing up funds for the individual to purchase other needed items.

The food given out during the Thanksgiving giveaway covered the menu for a Thanksgiving Day meal, from macaroni and cheese to cake mix, fresh sweet potatoes to turkeys.

Moses said Charlotte’s Cupboard plans to do a meal giveaway at Christmas as well.