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The Village in Oakland

The Village in Oakland

Grassroots & volunteer-run by unhoused, housing insecure and formally unhoused folks

  • LAND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
  • About Us
  • Reframing homelessness
  • Our Community
    • Core Team
  • Upcoming Events
  • Our Work
    • Direct Services
    • Policy Advocacy
      • Policy Advocacy
      • Policy Reports We Have Worked On
    • Education
    • Word On The Curb – Media Advocacy
      • About Word On The Curb
      • Word On The Curb – Blog & Youtube Playlist
      • Word On The Curb Podcast
    • Cardboard and Concrete
      • What We Believe
      • Tarpestries
      • Past Events
    • 510Day!
    • Living Room Block Parties
    • Deeply Rooted Oakland – Oakland General Plan 2045
  • The Village in Oakland Years in Review 20017 – 2024:
  • Resources
  • Media
    • News
    • The Village Youtube Playlists
    • Past Events
    • Word On The Curb
  • Job Opportunities

Feed the People

Feed the People started in January 2016 when Needa Bee and her then 14 year-old daughter Joyous Efiya De Asis Miralle started sharing weekly hot meals to four curbside communities in Oakland.

Since 2016, Feed The People has been hitting the streets shoring hot meals, groceries, clean drinking water, provisions, and hugs to Oakland’s unhoused residents.

This weekly curbside dinner-date that the mother-daughter team kicked off became a team of more than 60 volunteers by Summer 2016. Homies, family, and comrades came every week to caravan thru The Town and share love with 40 curbside communities.

  • During the COVID Pandemic, Feed The People’s efforts crippled in scope as a majority of food service providers sheltered in place.
  • Currently Feed The People, operates out of a mobile grocery store. But occasionally the program sets up buffet style service to share food during special events for unhoused folks.

Currently, Feed the People operates out of a customized mobile grocery store that continues to serve 40 Oakland curbside communities. The program has expanded to delivering groceries and hot meals to housed seniors, and families with small children experience food scarcity. We have also expanded the service to Berkeley curbside communities and unhoused residents of Downtown San Francisco.

Feed The People is the foundational program of The Village in Oakland. Thru Feed The People, and the relationships we build and voices we hear of folks living on the streets, every service, program and campaign is informed by the work of this service. When people would like to join Village in Oakland’s volunteer team, Feed The People is the program every starts off with.  Feed The People is also our outreach program, where we can share information, resources and referrals with our people over food. The program also is used as an opportunity to engage our community in civic engagement thru surveys or art activities that help inform and design policy reccomendations we make to government.

Copyright © 2025