Birmingham police have stopped two Christian organizations from feeding the homeless in the city.
The police and city officials say that because of a new ordinance passed at the behest of restaurant owners to stop food trucks in the city the ministries can no longer take their trucks to hand out free hot dogs and water to those in need.
“I’m just so totally shocked that the city is turning their back on the homeless like this,” Pastor Rick Wood told WBMA-TV. “It’s like they want to chase them out of the city. And the homeless can’t help the position they’re in. They need help.”
The Lord’s House of Prayer has been feeding the poor and homeless in Birmingham every Saturday for the last six years before the police stopped them from feeding the hungry.
Birmingham’s mayor is all in favor of keeping the ministries from feeding the homeless because he says there has to be consistency to the law.
“What’s the quality of that hot dog? Where did it come from?” Mayor William Bell snapped when asked about the situation.
Don Williams of Bridge Builders Ministries said that police also stopped his group from feeding the homeless. Williams noted that there is nothing in the city’s law that addresses feeding the homeless for free from a truck, so the Mayor and police are acting beyond the bounds of the law.
