2 minute read
Steve Tate
Steve Tate believes that all you need to do is look around and see where God is working and then join God in that work. That is what led him to get involved with Christian Appalachian Project (CAP) and to bring a team of volunteers twice a year to be a part with him.
“A long time ago, I looked for opportunities where God was working and obviously, He’s working here with CAP,” said Tate, a CAP donor and a volunteer. “We come here to do whatever CAP needs done. We work mostly on infrastructure so the organization can reallocate resources it needs to serve a lot of people.”
The group of 20 volunteers that joined Tate in November for a service trip to Appalachia were from Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina. The groups that Tate brings normally join with CAP’s Facilities Management staff to complete capital improvements that free up funds that CAP can then use for direct human service programs. This year, they helped build a pavilion and remodeled some dormitories at Camp Shawnee and
helped make substantial progress on the expansion of the Eagle Food Pantry in McCreary County which expects to have at least 800 families that need help addressing food insecurity.
“The kind of poverty that is in Appalachia, we have seen in different parts of the country. There is hope that people have,” Tate said. “I keep getting more and more people that want to join us to do another infrastructure project for CAP. The Christian fellowship is outstanding. We have people that watched us on other projects at CAP and asked if they could join our group. Now, we have people also on our team from Minnesota and Wisconsin. We are all working together for God.”
CAP opened the Eagle Food Pantry in June 2021. The expansion will include a 2,760 sq foot facility that will have offices, a covered area for drive-thru service, a shopping area that will provide participants the opportunity to select what they need for their families, freezer space for perishable items like meats, and a loading dock to accommodate large deliveries for the pantry.