What's Up - Your guide to what's happening in Fayetteville, AR this week!
Issue link: https://www.epageflip.net/i/1323916
Chris Selby Food And Funds On March 20, Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson ordered that restaurants and bars be closed to the public in an attempt to slow the continuing spread of covid-19. Restaurants were allowed to continue serving through delivery and curbside pick-up — albeit to a much lower volume of customers — but bars had no such income potential. The impact on those in the hospitality industry was immediate and dire in Northwest Arkansas, and Chris Selby, who owns and runs his own food delivery service, was in a position to witness the panic first hand. Selby didn't wait for some other organization to swoop in and help; instead, he capitalized on his social media following and larger-than-life personality to help raise and distribute funds and food himself. "I knew tons of people who were instantly out of work with no way to get money," Selby says. "So I did what everyone would expect — I went live on Facebook with a one-person dance party and wrote everyone's Venmo, etc., on a big white board and tried to get folks to donate to those who needed a boost. Also, I got pretty drunk." Selby's infectious enthusiasm soon led to others in the community pitching in to help. "One night, I decided I was going to buy some Eureka Pizzas and give them out for free," he explains. "I bought five or six and asked my friends to send me their addresses if they needed a pizza. That morphed into me working with local places to buy food from them using donations or them donating food to help. For two or three months, we were delivering free food to 65-plus addresses. It was a lot. I found a volunteer driver for every one of those days. I would give out their Venmo if folks wanted to help pay them for the work. "Mangos Gourmet Taco Shop was the backbone — they sold us tons of burritos for really, really cheap. Woodstone Pizza donated tons of free pizzas even though they were closed. "Dot's Chicken; Cafe Rue Orleans; Wicked Wood Fired Pizza; Foghorn's; Leo's Taqueria; Girls Gone BBQ ; Hammontree's; Rymolene's Pies — I'm sure there were more. Some came to me; I went to some." At the same time he was coordinating the delivery of free food for hospitality workers, he was also conducting Facebook fundraisers for single parents. "I think it was pretty successful," he says. "I really worked myself to death, though. I don't think I could've done it any longer. Pretty much every second I was awake, I was thinking about how to get people to help deliver the next day, what food to get and just organizing it. It was a whole lot. I kind of did a lifetime of philanthropy in a few months. And a huge thanks to all of the volunteer drivers. OMG, they were freaking amazing." Selby also notes that MayDay Community Kitchen took over all of the addresses he had gathered through the course of the project and "helped with food toward the end." — LARA JO HIGHTOWER Nate Walls Food Is Love Nate Walls has long fed the hungry: He grew up helping his mother run a cafe in Stuttgart and went on to cook for large groups in the Army. Today he runs Secondhand Smoke, a barbecue catering service that frequently works with nonprofit organizations in the area to help keep community members fed. So when a friend asked for help at the beginning of the pandemic, Walls was more than ready to answer the call. "A friend of mine, Carl Dunn, reached out to me and asked me if I could do anything about the community kids because his wife worked at the Yvonne Richardson Community Center," he says. "I said, 'Of course!' My wife and I decided to take out $1,000 to put forth to the communities that I knew would be most affected. I wanted it to mirror the struggle that was actually going on, so I went to Sam's and got bulk items and nonperishables and created what we used to call 'struggle meals' but in reality they are just meals that we all grew up with — comfort foods." Here's the thing about Walls that sets him apart: He doesn't just hand out physical, tangible items like food and supplies. He extends his ear and his empathy, and he comes out the other side, he says, with a deeper knowledge of the struggle experienced by folks from all kinds of backgrounds. "I went out with the thought that I would help people, and I had a pretty good idea what poverty looked like, but I was wrong," he says. "Poverty wasn't just black. It was white people in trailer parks; white, Marshallese and Hispanic people in apartment complexes. I ran into people of all ethnicities going through terrible situations like domestic abuse, sexual abuse, teenage pregnancies, [people who had] other needs like feminine products without knowledge of how to get them, child care — issues that I was kind of aware of, but during covid, these services and resources just weren't available. So I partnered with Light House Solutions, a nonprofit that finds people in poverty resources, and My-T-Bydesign, an art therapy program that encourages kids and families to talk about their problems in a therapeutic setting." Walls' work has clearly attracted attention: This week, he found out he had been nominated for the Division of Arkansas Heritage's 2021 Arkansas Food Hall of Fame in the category of People's Choice Award. The program, according to the DAH, "salutes our unique foods, legendary restaurants, remarkable chefs, influential food entrepreneurs and culturally significant festivals and events." "It started with food, then trust, then communication, then resources," says Walls. "It really does take a village — or a 'Ville.'" — LARA JO HIGHTOWER Chris Selby, pictured here with fellow food activist Nate Walls, says he and his volunteer drivers were delivering free food to 65-plus addresses at the height of his project. Walls cooked and served hundreds of Fayetteville community members and has been nominated to the 2021 Arkansas Food Hall of Fame in the category of People's Choice Award. (Courtesy Photo) JANUARY 3-9, 2021 WHAT'S UP! 7 2020 IN REVIEW