Needy get free meals, aid inside Turner Field

ATLANTA - Thousands of the city's neediest stretched outside Turner Field, awaiting a warm taste of soul food and a friendly helping hand.

They entered at the stadium's upscale Lexus Level, where on spring days, baseball fans sit in lush club-level boxes surrounded by amenities. On Martin Luther King Day, it was the city's poor and homeless who were showered with gifts by Hosea Feed the Hungry & Homeless volunteers.

Corporate luxury boxes were converted into makeshift medical clinics and long-distance phone booths, where guests could get their blood sugar tested and call faraway relatives for free. Volunteers offered legal help and counseling at tables set up along the carpeted hallway, which echoed with the sound of gospel and hip-hop music.

Thousands of Atlantans eagerly lined up for a hot plate of ham, turkey, collard greens, dirty rice and corn bread, washed down with a cold soft drink and topped off with a chocolate sundae for dessert.

"There's so much love here," said Terrence Falin, who has been staying at a local homeless shelter. "Everybody's so nice."

About 12,000 meals were served with the help of about 1,000 volunteers, said Elisabeth Omilami, an event co-director.

Marshaling volunteers with speed and grace, Ms. Omilami proudly wore a black T-shirt branded with the image of her late father, civil rights leader Hosea Williams, standing alongside the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. on the Memphis balcony where Dr. King would be assassinated.

Three years after Dr. King was killed, Mr. Williams began the charity, serving 100 men a week each Sunday. Before he died in 2000, the group had grown to serve tens of thousands of the poor and homeless at Thanksgiving dinners each year.

When Ms. Omilami took charge of the group after her father's death, she and her husband expanded it to offer free meals on Dr. King's memorial day, too.

Burdened by the strain of feeding evacuees from Hurricane Katrina, the charity has had to rely more on volunteers and pare its menu offerings.

"We had to cut back on black-eyed peas, which was difficult for me," Ms. Omilami said.

It was hard to tell of any setback, though, given the uplifting mood of many of the volunteers.

Boisterous organizers staffed a dance stage, giving loud words of encouragement: "You can still be blessed and be homeless," one asserted.