Written by: Amanda Jerzak, Food Sourcing Manager
Date: Friday, July 3, 2020
March 16th was a day that I don’t think I’ll ever forget. It was the day we had to scrap everything we knew and implement an emergency distribution strategy in the face of COVID-19. I suddenly found myself on the front lines of not only getting the food into our warehouse for distribution, but also working with our team to figure out how to move the most food possible into our community in a brand new way.
Last year, more than 272,000 people throughout Southern Nevada didn’t know where their next meal would come from. Now, that number has jumped to more than 447,000 people. Our city was shut down, the supply chain was compromised, and our dedicated distribution channels were unusable. The need was immense and we weren’t even sure how we were going to deliver food or how long our current supply would sustain us. What could we do?
What we did was true to Las Vegas: we took a gamble. We decided on a course of action, with as much thought and consideration possible, to address an unknown situation. In the last 12 weeks, we have distributed more than 12.5 million meals to our community through our Emergency Distribution Strategy. We have built a foundation for the uncertain time we are experiencing, and when it’s time to alter this strategy, we’ll do so again. We will continue to adjust to meet the needs of our people, and we will continue to passionately pursue a hunger-free community, even in the face of a pandemic.
Mother Teresa’s quote below sums up how I look at what we do every day at Three Square. What we had is no longer, it will continue to change and evolve. The only thing that will not change is our vision: that no one in our community should be hungry.
What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight. Build anyway.
If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous. Be happy anyway.
The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow. Do good anyway.
Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough. Give the best you've got anyway.