Town restaurants donate proceeds to ?ght hunger

The Chapel Hill restaurant community rallied together Tuesday to combat hunger.

Tuesday was the 24th annual RSVVP Day, or “Restaurants Sharing 10 Percent” — the ‘V’s are Roman numerals — benefiting the Inter-Faith Council for Social Service.

A total of 106 restaurants in Chapel Hill donated 10 percent of the day’s profits to the council.

The money raised will go towards the council’s FoodFirst programs, which include a community kitchen and food pantry which distributed about 18,000 grocery bags of food last year.

Restaurants including Ye Olde Waffle Shoppe, Buns Burgers and Fries, and Mediterranean Deli participated this year.

Jon Dorward, associate director of the council, emphasized the importance of community support for fundraising.

“There are an awful lot of the restaurants in Chapel Hill that are locally owned and operated,” he said. “They care about giving back to their community.”

Mediterranean Deli owner Jamil Kadoura, who has participated in this event for all 24 years, said the fundraiser’s strength is rooted in its impact on the community.

“This particular program is special to me because we are in touch with it, we see it,” he said.

Dorward said that while this is the council’s largest fundraiser of the year, the restaurants also support the council in other ways throughout the year.

“A lot of the restaurants, if they have leftover food, they will donate it back to us,” he said.

RSVVP has grown in recent years and raised a little more than $20,000 last year.

While Dorward is hoping the council will raise a similar amount this year, he said the economy might hamper its efforts.

As the event grows and more restaurants join the cause, Kadoura said its nature has changed.

Initially, when only a few restaurants participated, their business significantly increased due to the event’s publicity.

Now, since so many restaurants take part, Kadoura said each restaurant’s business seems relatively unaffected.

He said while individual restaurants don’t see the jump in usage that they used to, the overall profit for the council has increased.

But Subash Panneerselvam, the chef manager of Cholanad, said reservations at the restaurant looked more like a Friday than a Tuesday night.

Bandido’s Mexican Cafe also participated in the event. Upon learning about RSVVP while eating at Bandido’s on Tuesday, Chapel Hill resident Jake Rohde said RSVVP made him feel less guilty about eating out.

Contact the desk editor at city@dailytarheel.com.