1. Volunteers Help End Hunger At
Three Square
Rows of meatal shelving sprawled out across the smooth concrete floor of the warehouse. I could not
help but look up in child-like wonder at the stacks of food that towered overhead. Things like granola
bars close to their expiration date, cake mix in the wrong packaging, even huge 3 foot boxes of slightly
bruised produce like oranges, apples and corn were all in a state transition. I could hear the beep, beep,
beep of a forklift in reverse a few rows over moving unseen cargo to its next location. Our group walked
past the loading dock, a couple of box trucks were lined up at the loading bays, their rear doors rolled
up patiently waiting for someone to load the pallets of canned beans, fruit juice, and rice that were sit-
ting in the bay. An 8 ½ x 11 inch sheet of paper protruded through the shrink wrap of the pallet with
the words Mother Teresa’s Pantry printed out in type.
Las Vegas Nevada is legendary for many things, world class resorts, blazing 100 degree heat, world’s
largest strip club, but behind the sparkling lights and 24 hour video poker Las Vegas can use some
help… literally. According to the Corporation for National and Community Service, the state of Nevada
ranked almost dead last at 49th
out of 50 states in 2013 for volunteerism. For an organization like Three
Square Food Bank volunteering an essential part of keeping its services running. Accepting applicants
10 years old and up, my 12 year old daughter and I decided to log on to their www.threesquare.org
website and sign up for an orientation so we can see for ourselves what it means to be a volunteer.
Located off of North Pecos Road in an industrious part of town, I was a little nervous driving there for
the first time, but I was pleasantly surprised to find a modern, state of the art building. The receptionist
at the front door pointed us down the cheery orange and yellow hall to a decorative iron archway with
the words Hilton Park brightly illuminating the space around it. A petite girl with a shiny Three Square
name badge checked us in. Her name was Mikell Goheen and she is the Volunteer Administrator who
leads the orientations for the newbies. Mikell told us about herself.
“I started out as a volunteer but found that I liked volunteering so much I decided to apply for a job.
That was about a year ago,” she said smiling.
The smile seamed genuine. As we started our orientation walk I began to wonder if volunteering
would be something I would feel so strongly about. Could I really fit in here?
The concept of the food bank is a surprisingly recent one. In 1967 John van Hagel overheard a mother
complain that the only way she could feed her children was by going to a soup kitchen or by rummag-
ing through a store’s garbage. Van Hagel wanted to create a system that worked like a bank. He estab-
lished a foundation where food or money could be “deposited” and stored for “withdraw” later by those
who were in need (firstfoodbank.org). Three Square functions to serve the communities of 4 counties
in southern Nevada not only as a food bank, but also runs programs to provide meals to children, assist
people with government food assistance programs, and as a rental space for banquets. Mikell informed
us that Three Square rescues more than 1 million pounds of food through its retail partners each
month. That is equal to approximately 800,000 meals. That is a lot less waste going in the dumpster.
As we walked through the warehouse Mikell pointed out that they also buy many food items for use
in their various programs. One such program is the Backpack for Kids. In the Clark County School
District 58% of children are on either free or reduced price meals due to their family income. The
Backpack for Kids program bridges the gap between school days and the weekend by providing nutri-
tious meals for school children to eat when they do not have access to the food they usually get at
school. The food items that are in the packs are purchased new with money from grants and donors.
Mikell motioned towards a grey radio sitting on a ledge “We turn the music up and have a blast here
in the morning packing backpacks, it goes pretty quick.”
We entered an area of the warehouse where the walls were plastered with pictures. In the photos
groups of people were smiling and wearing Three Square t-shirts. There were small groups of about 4
or 5 people to large groups of about 30 people. Below each picture there was a caption with the com-
pany name each group was from.
The next stop on our tour was the kitchen. The kitchen was roomy and spotless with large stainless
steel appliances. My daughter looked over to me with a look on her face stating that this is where she
wanted to work, she liked being in a kitchen. Hundreds of red paper food boxes were neatly stacked
and lined up on shelving, ready to be filled with such treasures as pizzas or hamburgers. Mikell told us
that the kitchen volunteers made the boxed meals for kid’s afterschool programs and during the sum-
mer they made the Kid’s Cafe lunches that children can access through a variety of locations through-
out the city. Today was chicken sandwich day. There were ladies standing in an assembly line fashion
placing items like buns, lettuce, tomatoes, cheese, chicken, and a dill pickle into the red paper boxes.
Because it was summer there were a lot of moms as well as tweens and teenagers helping out. I asked
some of the teenagers if they were from the same high school and they said yes. They actually got
school credit for volunteering and they were all there to build up their hours.
The last stop on our tour was the banquet rooms and demonstration kitchen.
Mikell’s face lit up,“This is one of my favorite things we do here! We offer onsite and offsite catering
with banquet areas where you can rent out a space if you ever need to host a party or a meeting. Our
chefs are always busy with our different banquet and catering requests.”
The boardroom had one long table with about 20 plush leather chairs stationed on either side. There
was a large whiteboard at the end. The banquet room had about 10 circular tables set up and a podium
in the middle. It looked as though they were setting up for an event because the tables were set with
plates and silverware placed neatly beside them resting atop starched white linen napkins. The dem-
onstration kitchen was my favorite though, I imagined a chief working his magic on the stainless steel
cooktop with a dish like Sautéed Chicken Angelo topped with artichokes, munster cheese and white
wine garlic sauce, the oven baking some smoked fingerling potatoes to perfection. My stomach was
starting to growl. Volunteering for events would be fun.
Our tour was coming to an end and we thanked Mikell for showing us around. We now had access
to the online volunteer calendar where we can schedule ourselves for a shift. When we go home I was
excited to log in and see what days were available. I put us down for a Tuesday morning in volunteer
room at 9 am. Here we go!
Tuesday came and we showed up bright and early. As instructed we wore closed toed shoes, shirts
with sleeves, and baseball hats so we didn’t have to wear hair-nets if we were needed in the kitchen.
We punched in to the volunteer time clock and went to our scheduled room. To my surprise there was
no one there. I walked into the supervisor’s office and she told me they needed everyone’s help in the
kitchen this morning.
My daughter and I filed into the kitchen where there was a mass of people working quickly making
Kid’s Café meals, and preparing boxes. One of the Chiefs smiled at us and walked us over to the muf-
fin station. We had to open a pack of English muffins and place each muffin in an individual wrapper.
It was awkward at first, the wrappers did not want to stay closed, but I quickly developed a system.
The music was playing, Pharrell Williams singing about being happy. Stuff, flip, wrap, again stuff, flip,
wrap. I continued for about 500 muffins. It was not difficult work. I found my flow and it felt some-
what relaxing. I thought a little bit about the muffins I was packing and envisioned each one going to
their new home and easing someone’s pain, at least for a little while. School starts back up in another
month and most of the moms and kids that were helping out today were going to be busy with their
own lives again. It looks like they will be short-handed. I wondered if I could squeeze some volunteer
time in on my own when my daughter was at school. Maybe I should sign up.
Three Square Food Bank
4190 N. Pecos Rd.
Las Vegas, NV 89115
(702)644-3663
www.threesquare.org
by: Julie Ansell