When Awodele Omilami was growing up, he never had a normal family dinner for Thanksgiving or Christmas.
He is the oldest son of Elisabeth and Afemo Omilami, and the grandson of Hosea Williams.
For them, a normal Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner meant feeding thousands of poor and homeless people annually through Hosea Feed the Homeless and now Hosea Helps.
“We were always at Turner Field being of service,” said Omilami, who started working in the family business, loading pallets of food and scooping soup into bowls when he was 14. “It was exciting. Hosea Williams was feeding 8,000 people a day and delivering 5,000 meals with 600 volunteers. At no other time of the year would you see something like that.”
Now, at the age of 44 and days away from Thanksgiving, Omilami is marking a new era at Hosea Helps as the organization’s newly installed CEO. He takes over from his mother, Elisabeth, who is slowing down as the face of the organization as she continues to recover from a 2022 diagnosis of breast cancer.
Credit: Ernie Suggs
Credit: Ernie Suggs
“It has been a great feeling being of service, but also knowing you can be good at it,” said Omilami, a 2003 graduate of Clark Atlanta University, where he majored in religion and philosophy. “But you can also be bad at it. Growing up in it made me want to be great.”
On Wednesday afternoon, Omilami sat at a folding table outside of the Hosea Helps headquarters in Perkerson Park as a line of cars wrapped around the block. It was for the weekly fresh food donation.
A woman, not in a car, walked up with her four children. They need rent money, which is a social service that the organization also provides. When Omilami later told his mother about it and the fact that they provided the mother with the needed funds, Elisabeth Omilami smiled.
Going into his first holiday season in charge, Omilami said he doesn’t feel any outside pressure.
“Most of the pressure is coming from inside of me,” Omilami said. “I can see the next phase of this organization. The pressure is not to continue what was being done, but to adapt to what people need now.”
This year’s efforts to feed people in Atlanta will look completely different from how it looked in any of the previous 54 years under Hosea Williams and, later, Elisabeth Omilami when they ran the program.
Credit: Hosea Helps
Credit: Hosea Helps
For decades, it was defined by its massive holiday events where thousands of people would meet for dinner, while also getting health screenings, haircuts, hygiene care, clothes and provisions.
In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, as social distancing became the norm and the price of available venues skyrocketed, the program shifted primarily to a drive-thru service where people came to the headquarters to pick up meals.
“The liability was just too big,” Omilami said.
Credit: Steve Schaefer
Credit: Steve Schaefer
Omilami said the definition of homelessness has broadened past the stereotypic image of a man on a corner to now include people living in hotels, couch surfing and college students without stable addresses. The shape of poverty, he said, comes in many forms.
Now, “Thanksgiving” at Hosea Helps will begin on Saturday when they distribute 500 meal kits to families consisting of a turkey, with all the sides and beverages. Elisabeth Omilami said allowing families to go home and cook their meals will give them a sense of dignity.
On Thanksgiving Day, close to 100 volunteers will deliver 500 meal kits to families throughout metro Atlanta. They will also deliver cooked meals to homeless shelters, transitional hotels and senior citizens centers.
“We are in a position to experiment with solutions,” Omilami said.
The organization started by happenstance two years after Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated.
Many of King’s key lieutenants searched for ways to carry out the mission of nonviolent civil rights activism, even if it took different forms. Andrew Young, for example, picked elective politics.
On a cold November night in 1970, Hosea Williams, who was beaten alongside John Lewis on Bloody Sunday as they tried to cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge, was walking down Auburn Avenue, where he spotted a homeless man eating out of the trash can.
At that moment, his advocacy became addressing poverty.
A few days later, at the Wheat Street Baptist Church, Williams held his first Hosea Feeds the Hungry and Homeless Thanksgiving Dinner. His wife, Juanita Williams, cooked the soup and Elisabeth Omilami cooked the cornbread.
When Williams died on Nov. 16, 2000, Elisabeth Omilami took over. Hosea Helps, as it is now called, is one of Atlanta’s leading charities, feeding, clothing and offering social services to more than 51,000 people annually.
Traditionally serving people on Thanksgiving and Christmas, they held their first dinner on Martin Luther King Jr. Day in 2005 and have since expanded to Easter. That same year, they also changed their name to Hosea Helps, to better emphasize the organization’s move to offer a wider variety of social services throughout the year.
Credit: robert.andres@ajc.com
Credit: robert.andres@ajc.com
In 2021, they raised $1.8 million to purchase and open their new facility. When they cut the ribbon, it marked the first time that Hosea Helps owned its own building.
Walking around the offices of Hosea Helps, Omilami remains deferential to his parents, saying “yes ma’am,” and “yes sir.”
Omilami said he has been trying to take over Hosea Helps for years by “trying to position myself to understand what the next phase of this organization is supposed to look like.”
Elisabeth Omilami listens and smiles. She acknowledges that she is slowing down but admits that she didn’t know how to “let it go.”
Credit: Ernie Suggs
Credit: Ernie Suggs
“I wanted to see the organization have a future while I am still here. His vision is much different from mine. I couldn’t take it any further so I felt now is the time,” said Elisabeth Omilami, 73. “He is the real deal. But I don’t want him to feel like he is trapped here. I want him to want to be here.”
Elisabeth Omilami will assume more of an advocacy role within the organization and continue to raise awareness of the needs of the poor and the homeless, she said.
“I still have miles to go before I sleep. Hosea Williams was a workaholic and made everyone around him a workaholic,” she said. “I don’t know how to rest, but I don’t want to worry about how many turkeys we have.”
Wearing all black, Omilami is a spitting image of his father Afemo, an acclaimed film and stage performer. He directs a visitor to the restroom and encourages the many volunteers who are loading fresh food into the line of cars.
“One thing I have learned on the path of becoming CEO is that even as a child, there are a lot more people out here trying to make the world a better place than you can see,” Omilami said. “I am aware that I am part of a much bigger effort.
To volunteer and donate to Hosea Helps, visit their website.
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