Los Angeles Dodgers free agent Justin Turner celebrated his birthday Monday by passing out turkeys and sides at The Dream Center, accompanied by his wife. The Justin Turner Foundation has partnered with AM 570 L.A. Sports for a season of giving.
To remain compliant with CDC and local health guidelines, the Turners and Dream Center staff passed out more than 1,5000 turkeys in a drive-thru. The local nonprofit previously transitioned to such a distribution earlier this year because of the pandemic.
The Turners were involved in that as well, organizing with local restaurants to have meals delivered directly to The Dream Center, where they would then be distributed in the drive-thru for 11 hours each day.
The remarkable stretch culminated with the unveiling of the Justin and Kourtney Turner Food Bank. It provides for 60 other organizations in the area, plus daily feeding at The Dream Center, and it is binge utilized to supply 23 mobile food bank sites with up to 200 bags of groceries each (per day).
The Turners have worked closely with The Dream Center for several years, and have been involved with four consecutive Christmas Dreamland events. Last December, the couple assisted with distributing more than 8,000 toys, which were separated by gender and age group to ensure each child received a suitable gift.
Justin Turner credits Kourtney for Roberto Clemente Award nomination
Turner was named the Dodgers’ nominee for the prestigious Roberto Clemente Award a third time in the past four years. “First and foremost, Kourtney should be sitting up here next to me,” he said when discussing the honor.
“She deserves as much of the credit and recognition for this award as I get. She’s been unbelievable for our foundation, keeping everything organized, moving forward, responding and setting things up. I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for her.
“I would have no chance of doing this if it wasn’t for her. She is incredibly organized, she spends hours and hours on her computer every day, going through emails, answering emails, setting up food deliveries, reaching out to different companies for sponsors.
“We don’t have a whole lot of help. She takes the reins on pretty much everything because she’s a believer if you want things done the way you want them done, you just do it yourself. Almost to a fault she takes on so much. Sometimes it’s tough on her, but she always comes up in the clutch and gets it done. There would be no Justin Turner Foundation if it wasn’t for her.”
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