Mona Shield Payne / Special to the Home News

Administrative assistant Shelley Aguiar tallies the weight of food donated by the Henderson Police Department during a food drive competition organized by the Community Development Department at City Hall.

By Jeremy Twitchell (contact)

Thu, Nov 27, 2008 (midnight)

For two weeks in mid-November, city of Henderson employees squared off in a fiercely competitive contest that went down to the wire.

And though the official tally showed that the Criminal Division of the city attorney’s office edged out the other city departments, the real winners were the families who received some of the 3,567 pounds of food and $700 that city employees raised in their first interdepartmental food drive.

Employees used the money to purchase 250 pounds of canned ham to add to the collection, then bundled most of the food they collected into 50 baskets and gave them to local churches to distribute to needy families. The remainder went to local food banks.

What began as a friendly challenge issued by Community Development to the city’s other departments — with Community Development offering to bake pies for the winning department — escalated into an all-out race in the food drive’s final days.

Community Development stoked the fires two days before the end of the drive, when it sent out an e-mail to city employees showing a little more than 700 pounds of food donated, with the Community Development and Finance Departments well ahead of everyone else and competing for the top spot.

The e-mail struck a chord. Just 48 hours later, when the drive was to end, the total had jumped by about 2,000 pounds, and employees agreed to add an extra day to accommodate the last-minute dropoffs.

One of those deliveries came from the city attorney’s Criminal Division, which had been quiet for most of the drive. It showed up with a loaded pickup of food on the final day of the drive and claimed victory with 575 pounds of food.

Community Development Director Stephanie Garcia-Vause said employees hung signs around City Hall to remind each other about the drive, but the signs had an unintended effect.

“We had customers coming into City Hall for other business who would see the signs and ask how they could get on the list for help,” she said. “We know that the community is really hurting right now.”

Carol Knott, an administrative secretary in the city’s Information Technology Department, said the simplicity of the drive made it easy for employees to get involved.

“As individuals, sometimes it’s hard to know where to help,” she said. “But when you’re challenged like this and able to take part in a group effort, it just feels really good.”

Adding the competitive element to the food drive made a difference, and not just because of the promise of pie, employees said.

After all, pie is temporary, but bragging rights last forever — or at least for a year. Henderson employees have planned to make the food drive an annual tradition.

Jeremy Twitchell can be reached at 990-8928 or jeremy.twitchell@hbcpub.com.