By recognizing Don Poe as 2024 Citizen of the Year, the Rotary Club of Statesboro and Rotary Club of Downtown Statesboro on Wednesday in effect also saluted the Feed the Boro charitable organization of which Poe is president. In early February, Feed the Boro distributed the equivalent of a 2 millionth meal.

That meal count had begun a little over three years earlier after the COVID-19 pandemic halted what for a quarter century had been a volunteer effort to cook and serve free Thanksgiving dinners. Poe and other volunteers and donors then relaunched Feed the Boro into a series of almost monthly “food drops,” or drive-thru distributions of prepare-at-home groceries for households in need.

“We can’t do it without wonderful people like you, and more than anything I have an incredible committee,” Poe said, holding the award. “It’s not Don Poe; I’m going to have to reproduce 15 of these and give them away because I have an incredible committee that works with me, including my beautiful, charming wife over there.  … That being said, thank you again, I appreciate it, and it will be in a place of honor in my home.”

The two local Rotary Clubs meet for a shared luncheon around this time each year to honor a citizen, chosen by a joint committee, for outstanding contributions to the community. Wednesday’s event was held, as usual, in the ballroom at Forest Heights Country Club.

54th recipient

So, Poe became the 54th recipient of what began in 1971 as a “Rotary Man of the Year” award and in 1993 with the selection of Charlotte White evolved into the “Citizen of the Year.” After the first few years it was no longer limited to Rotary Club members, and Poe is not a Rotarian, although the two local clubs have also now made him a Paul Harris Fellow with donations to the Rotary Foundation in his name. For a number of years in the past he was a Statesboro Kiwanis member, and in fact was named that club’s 2011 Kiwanian of the Year and a 2012 Walter Zeller Fellowship recipient.

Statesboro Rotary Club President Bob Olliff gave the welcome and Downtown Rotary Club President Dr. Thad Riley introduced guests and past recipients. Past Citizens of the Year present included Ellis Wood (1991), Ray Hendley (2012), Charles Sikes (2014), Jimmy High (2017), Roy and Deborah Thompson (2019), Dr. Jack Proctor (2021) and Sen. Billy Hickman (2023).

Food Lion’s role

But club leaders invited Tod Marsh, Food Lion Statesboro store manager, as guest speaker. Having Marsh there to talk about the supermarket chain’s Food Lion Feeds charitable effort and its support for Feed the Boro was partly a ploy to make sure Poe would attend without telling him he would be the award recipient.

However, talking about those programs is exactly what Marsh did, up to the point when he started sharing the biography of “somebody very near and dear” to him.

“Food Lion Feeds is an organization that is part of Food Lion that is designed to help food insecurity in the counties and neighborhoods that we serve,” Marsh said. “We  are trying to reach a goal of 2.5 billion meals by 2025, and all  of that comes around to the reason that I want  to talk today about Feed the Boro.”

Marsh has had 40-year career in the grocery business and was manager of the store that is now the Statesboro Food Lion when it was a Bi-Lo. Food Lion has been “presenting sponsor” of Feed the Boro food drops since taking over the store three years ago. The company currently donates $25,000 a year to Feed the Boro, in addition to providing fresh produce for many of the drops, he said in an interview.

Marsh told the club members and guests it seems “unbelievable” that Bulloch County has a 29% poverty rate but that the response to the distributions shows that the “food insecurity need” here is exceptional. People lining up to receive a free week’s food supply for a household may arrive in vehicles ranging from a Lexus to “an old putter,” he said.

“But you never know what’s going on, and that’s the reason we at Food Lion want to be a part of it,” Marsh said. “Those  folks that come  through in a nice car, either they’re picking up for somebody or they’ve lost their job and they’re three car payments behind. So we help everybody, we don’t ask questions, and that’s the heart of Feed the Boro, anybody that needs food, they come through and get food.”

‘Willing to help’

Beginning the introduction, Marsh said, “I’m going to read a few things because it’s very hard to talk about all the things Don Poe has accomplished in his career as a person that is willing to help everybody that he comes across.”

Born in Bleckley, West Virginia, Poe enlisted in the Army in 1973 and became a Military Police officer. Discharged with the rank of sergeant in 1976, he returned home and began service as a civilian police officer, also serving for a time as a narcotics investigator. Later he had a career in sales, becoming a national sales manager with Patton Wallcoverings. He retired in 2020.

Don Poe had met his wife, Mary, in Texas, and they have now been married 39 years. They moved here in 1994, and so have been Statesboro residents for 30 years. They have three sons, Marc, Matthew and Eric; a daughter, Letitia; and three grandchildren, who all live elsewhere.

Poe’s volunteerism has included Cub Scout and Boy Scout leadership and work with other youth programs, mission trips and disaster relief efforts. He currently serves as coordinator for Bulloch County VOAD, or Volunteer Organizations Active in Disasters.

In his Kiwanis Club years, he was chairman for the fair in 2010 and 2011, founded the Statesboro Kiwanis Rodeo in 2010 and chaired it until 2014.

Previously a member of the Statesboro Food Bank’s board and its president 2014-2016, he began as chairman of Feed the Boro in 2016. By fall 2020, with the pandemic putting the mass gathering of volunteers needed for the Thanksgiving meal preparation out of the question, he and DeWayne Grice of VOAD began planning for what they thought would be a single drive-thru food drop, Poe said

Food drops continue

Now the next drop is planned for May 4, again at Statesboro High. Each distribution, mainly of food purchased at deep discount from the Second Harvest of Coastal Georgia food bank, is planned to serve 1,000 families.

“People just need food,” Poe said, but added that the food donations can help struggling families in a more general way.

“We try to give away to a family of four enough food to have two meals a day for a week, and takes about $250 to $300 worth of pressure off the families when then need it, and you don’t know what they need,” he said. “They may need rent assistance that month, maybe their electric bill’s past due, maybe Little Johnny’s got a birthday coming up and they need a present.”

A past recipient of the Deen Day Smith Service to Mankind Award for his work with youth programs, Poe has now added another community award to his collection.

“It’s quite an honor, ladies and gentlemen, and I certainly do appreciate it, and I appreciate even more the support of the Rotary Club for Feed the Boro,” he told the Rotarians. “You guys have supported several of our food drops”