Resource rally aids more than 400 families | News

Dr. Ann Kerlin, executive director of One Roof, said the items were given out on a first-come, first-served basis. The first cars started lining up at about 7:30 a.m., three hours before distribution would begin.

The $150,000 resources were provided by Feed The Children, a nonprofit focused on alleviating childhood hunger. Newnan was selected for the resource rally because of the Niagara Bottling Company’s plant location and because the area had yet to benefit from the company’s in-house service organization.

According to Joe Allegro, senior director of corporate partnerships with FTC, the Newnan resource rally kicks off a series of 15 service events across the country with other Niagara Bottling facilities.

“The outreach is all done by One Roof,” Allegro said. “You have two national partners coming together, but we needed that local community help from One Roof to figure out who these people were.”

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 7.5 percent of the Coweta population lived in poverty in 2022. Kerlin stated the poverty rate is closer to 10 percent.

Kerlin said families were contacted through flyers in One Roof’s regularly distributed food boxes, communication through the Coweta Community Foundation, and texts sent to 1,100 families.

According to the plant’s director, Frank Versaggio, almost half of the employees at the Newnan Niagara Bottling plant volunteered…