Scouts to conduct annual food drive

By Jeff Pope

Thursday, Nov. 13, 2008 | midnight

Boy Scouts from throughout Southern Nevada will be collecting food for the area’s homeless for their annual Scouting For Food drive.

Every household in the region should receive a yellow and red bag for canned and dry foods to be left on the porch for the scouts to collect after noon on Nov. 15.

The Scouting for Food Drive is the largest single-day food drive in Nevada. More than 8,000 youth and adults will participate this year.

In 2007, Boy Scouts from Las Vegas and Pahrump collected 223 tons of food, which equaled roughly 450,000 items. Since 1988, the Boy Scouts have collected 3,573 tons of food or nearly 7 million items.

The goal is 230 tons of food this year, said Gary Lewis, activities and marketing director.

The Scouting for Food drive benefits Las Vegas’ needy families for the coming year. Last year’s total represents 4,600 boxes of food that will feed 420 families for three months.

The collected food is delivered to one of 31 Smith’s stores in Las Vegas. Once there, an army of scouts will sort, box and load more than 230 tons on trucks bound for the Salvation Army and Catholic Charities warehouses.

“We provide 60 percent of the Salvation Army’s food throughout the year,” Lewis said.

Jeff Pope can be reached at 990-2688 or [email protected].