Interview by Craig L. Amos, Publisher, Sir Quarterly Magazine

You may have seen on the news that city health inspectors came to the annual City Wide Club Super Feasts the day before the Christmas Eve Super Feast and ordered them to throw out several pounds of food because it wasn’t cooling at the right temperature.

We wanted to hear directly from the nonprofit organization that has been serving Houston’s needy for 47 years.

We met with Bishop Dr. Leroy Woodard Jr., President of City Wide Club of America, at Willie G’s Galleria restaurant.

Reflecting on your journey, how has the mission of feeding Houston’s needy evolved from your first meal to the massive, city-wide operation it is today?

We’ve been doing this for 47 years. That’s why I was surprised by what happened. I don’t get angry often, especially after doing this work for so long.

You learn to manage your anger and choose your battles. My main concern was that the food was thrown out without my permission. It was surprising how quickly and aggressively they decided to throw away freshly cooked food, even though nothing was wrong with it.

They said the food didn’t meet the cooling requirements, but there was no sign of contamination. I spoke directly with the health department director, who was very polite. We talked for almost an hour about their decision.

And obviously, she said that they’re following a federal code. But I upgraded the next question and asked, can you emphatically tell me the food was contaminated? She said, no. I said, so how would you make that determination? She said that they would have to take the food down to the lab and make that determination.

That was a big concern for me. I asked if the inspectors could have thrown out the food without my permission. She said no — they would have just given me a citation, and we could have taken legal action.

It was an insult to the kitchen volunteers, many of whom are retired chefs who volunteer year after year. In addition to the kitchen captain who holds her food-handling license, she has been the kitchen captain for the Super Feast for over 26 years!

We had volunteers who were very, very offended by the idea of throwing away food they had spent hours and days preparing for no reason. People who were in the kitchen, which takes hundreds of volunteers and about two days to prepare.

So the next issue was that we felt no remorse, and that’s what made me call a news conference, because I didn’t know how far they would go with that aggression, since we were like 75% finished.

So I didn’t know if they were going to walk in and start throwing food around, because we’ve never experienced that level of behavior with the health department. So I didn’t know what was next.

So this is the first time in 47 years that they’ve come in with oversight?

No. We’ve always been partners with the health department. We’ve never had one solitary problem with them.

That’s what makes it so confusing to me: for 47 years, with a stellar record, your level of aggression didn’t match, as if we didn’t know what we were doing. We’ve never had anyone on record get sick. About 47 years ago.

That should carry some kind of leverage. That should mean something. That should cause them to sort of fall back a bit and say, hey, listen, let’s see what we can do to raise the temperature.

Cooking food from scratch requires a lot of processing. What I mean is, everything we fix as it relates to the cornbread dressing: we bake the cornbread, add all the broth, add the seasoning, etc. We bake the turkeys, break them down, de-bone them, peel the sweet potatoes, and make them into yams.

I’m following my grandmother’s recipe, whom I promised to my father, okay? So what you feel ain’t cooling down enough, we’re still working on it. We’re still seasoning it up! Okay, we weren’t finished, so, you know, at the end of the day, we did more with less against the worst.

We did more with less against worse, and we fed all the people. Nobody was turned away. H-E-B came through, and a few other restaurants.

How does the crowd size for this year’s event fit into the broader history of the City Wide Club Super Feast?

Well, Thanksgiving and Christmas, we fed over 35,000 people (each). That was a reduced number from our expectations because we received so many calls from Hispanic families saying that they can’t bring all of their family at the same time because they were afraid of ISIS.

They were afraid that ISIS was going to pick up the husband and wife along with the children. So they decided to send the husband with the children; the wife stayed home or went with a few kids. So we didn’t see the kind of full attendance because they were afraid that ISIS was going to snatch them up.

Look, feeding is now widespread worldwide. We have 103 networking chapters, and the Super Feast now is all over Texas and other states during Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Those were started by volunteers who once lived in Houston but wanted to carry that same legacy in the cities that their careers were taking them.

In 1975, City Wide Club was an idea. It got chartered in 1982. But it goes back to 1960.

Out of my grandmother’s Third Ward kitchen, we served over 350 people.

Through the Christian Rescue Mission, which my father, Bishop L.J. Woodard, founded. Sr., and now we’re feeding and helping thousands of people. Over half a million people last year.

For many people, you are known for hot meals. What is the most common need you hear from the people you serve that isn’t food?

Look, hunger has no timetable. People just don’t decide to get hungry during the holidays. The feast serves as a powerful catalyst for bringing together people with diverse needs. That we can assign those needs through our daily human services. Like job placement, job keeping skills. We found out that we can place a person in a job. But if he’s been out of the job market for a minute, he has to be re-acclimated to how to keep a job. Like coming in on time. Like being honest. Like taking initiative.

We provide utility and rental assistance. We had to reduce our after-school program after the pandemic. Our youth after-school program grant was reduced due to the pandemic and related factors. And then the government cutbacks, so we are working with area churches and other organizations with their youth after-school programs. Some of it is through Zoom. Because a lot of these kids are Hispanic … they’re running from high school. They’re not even attending school. So, we do the process calls hotline.

The people call us by the hundreds. Needing help with whatever. If we can help them, we will. And of course, we will refer them out to other local organizations and areas.

City Wide Club is not top-heavy. It is volunteer-driven. It is one of the largest volunteer-based organizations, offering volunteers an opportunity to put in their sweat.

What would you say to a hesitant volunteer?

Listen, we want to welcome all volunteers to City Wide Club and its services. Especially the Super Feasts for Thanksgiving and Christmas.

As for the health department, you know, hindsight is always 20-20. Life is a classroom. It is a great institution. And it’s also decision management. I believe. From the meeting that we had with the mayor’s office, as well as the health department director. That we’ve learned from that experience. There are some obvious redirections that we need to do. So that they can feel comfortable moving forward, and that we can feel comfortable moving forward.

I think they’ve interviewed our stellar track record as a group that knows how to handle a massive gathering without chaos or illness. That longevity. And I believe that there’s wiggle room to be flexible with groups like us.

We always say that the biggest heart in the world is a volunteer’s heart. So please: We need your help!

We’re already registering people for Thanksgiving and Christmas 2026. So we are alive and well. And we’re ready to serve the people.

Has your organization been affected by DOGE?

We were. Because when people are laid off, they can’t give liberally, and because City Wide Club operates solely in the private sector. So yes, we were impacted.

When unemployment is high, charitable giving nationwide is obviously the first sector to be affected. And we felt it both corporately and individually.

To delve deeper, visit: CityWideClub.com

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