LETTER FROM THE CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER: THE BIG POP UP

First, I’d like to thank the amazing team at Southeastern Community Action Partnership who worked tirelessly day and night for months to help pull this event together. Additionally, I’d like to thank our wonderful community partners and sponsors who donated financially or provided goods and supplies for the local community. And last, but certainly not least, I’d like to thank you, the community for showing up to the Big Pop Up!

After months of planning this wonderful distribution purposed to give back to the local community, we had to stop the event due to safety reasons. This was a lesson learned for our agency as we were prepared to serve up to 2,000 families on-site, but we had no idea that traffic would block local intersections and highways. Law enforcement deemed it a major safety risk and advised us to stop the event – which is not something we imagined, but as we’ve said before, it is always our goal to ensure the safety of our staff, volunteers, and you, the public. 

Here’s what we learned – some of the attendees began lining up as early as 6 a.m., if not before, and as a result, we were advised to start the Big Pop Up at 8:30 am versus our planned 10:00 a.m. start to help ease some of the traffic on Fayetteville Road. I’m proud to say that in this short amount of time we were able to serve approximately 400 families that drove through at Robeson Community College! As the traffic continued to build, we were advised by law enforcement that we had to pause distribution in hopes of easing some of the traffic. However, as vehicles continued to arrive, the traffic did not ease and we were forced to stop the event. 

Unfortunately, we were not prepared to transport all of the goods and supplies to families when we had to stop the event. Instead, we donated some of the remaining goods and supplies to four local nonprofit organizations. 

We’d like to thank you for your support of Southeastern Community Action Partnership and The Big Pop Up. The magnitude of this event confirms that these types of resources are needed in our community, and as always, SCAP is here to meet those needs. We will be back – and better! 

The Mission Continues, 

Dr. Ericka J. Whitaker

Chief Executive Officer, Southeastern Community Action Partnership