HELP knows no state boundaries

Daniela Mohor

Friday, Nov. 23, 2001 | 9:17 a.m.

Eleven members of a Texas family traveled more than 1,200 miles to help Las Vegas' neediest residents during the Thanksgiving holiday.

Between an evening of gambling and a night of entertainment on the Strip, the family of Steve Casey volunteered to distribute Thanksgiving food baskets for HELP of Southern Nevada to more than 1,100 low-income families who signed up.

They spent Wednesday morning receiving the organization's clients, handing them bags filled with food and helping them carry their goods to their cars or to the nearest bus stop.

"It's something nice to do over the holiday because we know there are so many people that need help," said Yolanda Gregson, who lives in Austin. "This is an opportunity for us to spend time together and to do what we like to do."

The group -- Steve and Renee Casey, Renee's parents Dean and Darlene Rounds, the Casey's daughter and her husband, Megan and Jason Gregson, Gregson's parents, Alvin and Yolanda, Casey's sister and her husband, Beth and Bob Walls and their son, Jake Clawson -- decided a few months ago to spend the holiday in Las Vegas

Steve Casey realized they wouldn't have their traditional Thanksgiving dinner at his house in Houston. So he thought about another way for them to give thanks.

He called the Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce and asked what volunteer opportunities were available during the Thanksgiving holiday. The chamber referred him to HELP.

The rest of the family immediately liked his idea.

"I told them they could come and help if they wanted or they could do whatever they wanted to do," Casey said. "They all chose to come ... That's the kind of family they are."

All of the family members are involved in some kind of church work back home. For Christmas, in lieu of gifts for one another, they donate money or time to a charity. Helping Las Vegans in this time of hardship, they said, was just one more way to show their commitment to community service.

"We are so blessed to have everything we have," said Beth Walls, Casey's sister. "People all over need help, so our family is trying to think of the holiday not so much as what we get in our family, but to reach out to others."

The gesture surprised HELP officials.

"We've never had this before," Deni Conrad, HELP's executive director, said. "Usually it's been people who live here in the community" who volunteer.

The generosity of Casey's family, Conrad added, shows that since the terrorist attacks people have broadened their concept of community.

"The fact that someone would come here from another community ... and still wants to help us is a reflection of what the nation and what the world did as a whole to help the people of New York," she said. "We crossed those boundaries that said, 'This is mine, you can't come in and I'm not going out.'

"That's tremendous."