Update on Our Hurricane Response

Applications for Hurricanes Helene and Milton are now closed.

Cases are processed in the order in which they were received. We are distributing weekly updates regarding processing time; please watch for emails from our team!

If you applied for assistance unrelated to these disasters, we are working as quickly as possible to process your case. Please reach out to your case manager directly or casemanagement@southernsmoke.org for any updates. Thank you for your patience during this time of unprecedented volume.

We are so grateful for the outpouring of support, and thanks to generous donors, to date we have granted $680,800 to 487 F+B workers affected by Hurricanes Helene and Milton with 2,500 more being processed.

Kaitlyn Goalen

Board Member

Kaitlyn Goalen is an author, creative strategy consultant, and executive leadership advisor in the areas of hospitality, local food systems, and sustainability. She is the program director of Burkett Farm, a not-for-profit agricultural center that grows sustainable produce for donation to food banks and models ideas that support a regenerative food culture. From 2018 to 2023, she was the executive director of AC Restaurants, the hospitality group founded by chef Ashley Christensen in Raleigh, North Carolina. She is the editor and co-founder of Short Stack Editions, a series of single-subject, digest-size cookbooks, and co-authored a full-size cookbook, The Short Stack Cookbook, inspired by the series. She has co-authored three other books with chefs and beverage personalities, including It’s Always Freezer Season (2021) with Ashley Christensen; Cook Like a Local (2019) with Houston chef Chris Shepherd, which was shortlisted for Best American Cookbook by the James Beard Foundation; Poole’s (2016) with Raleigh chef Ashley Christensen; and The Craft Cocktail Party (2015) with Julie Reiner, the New York bar owner and cocktail personality.