ARK’s biannual food pantry serves nearly 600 people
The ARK Community Resource Center held its first mobile food pantry of 2025 on June 27, providing 143 families in the community with meals for one week.
The ARK Community Resource Center held its first mobile food pantry of 2025 on June 27, providing 143 families in the community with meals for one week.
The ARK partners with Second Harvest Food Bank to host these mobile pantries “open to any human in the world” twice a year. According to ARK Director Mike Turpin, they’ll only offer one in 2025.
The local nonprofit, which typically only serves families in South Cheatham, was able to assist 143 households, serving 354 adults and 235 children – a total of 589 people – across Middle Tennessee.
“Any human in the world can come to this [food pantry],” Turpin said. “No matter income, no matter anything, this one's open to everybody.”
Turpin said the nonprofit received around 7,000 pounds of food, and after the first hour of the three-hour event, it was nearly all gone.
The mobile food pantry was fueled by 50 volunteers from the community, according to the event’s volunteer coordinator Rachel Smiley. Many teachers of the local schools were present as well as leadership from the government in Kingston Springs.
South Side Disposal is a major partner of these events for the ARK, helping to dispose of the hundreds of boxes the food pantry items are delivered in. Lawrence Foods also donated their plastic bags that carried every food item. Additionally, the men’s Dickson branch of Hope Center Ministries sent out a team of volunteers who delivered flowers and prayed over each family who received items from the pantry.
“The people of Kingston Springs and Pegram are [just amazing] – they always show up big to help their neighbors,” Turpin said. “You can't get a better community than ours.”
The ARK hosts a weekly food pantry on Mondays for families in South Cheatham County. This growing season, the nonprofit organization launched a new initiative – “Share the Harvest, Grow a Row” – to encourage community members to plant an additional row in their personal gardens and donate them to the food pantry. The ARK also planted several community gardens around Kingston Springs and Pegram.
They began harvesting from their gardens last month, and have been able to distribute lettuce, zucchini, squash, green beans and kale. They will soon be able to harvest potatoes, tomatoes and okra.
According to Turpin, the ARK was forced to supplement its monthly food pantry deliveries with locally grown produce due to the Federal funding cuts in SNAP and senior assistance programs, which has caused an increase in food insecurity in Kingston Springs and Pegram.
