Letter: Heavenly gives back at Bread & Broth
To the community,
Heavenly Mountain Resort’s donation of $250 to sponsor an Adopt A Day of Nourishment made sure that many hungry members of the South Lake Tahoe community were able to enjoy Bread & Broth’s hot, nutritious meal on Sept. 16.
The evening’s meal was prepared by Bread & Broth’s cooking crew and a volunteer crew from Heavenly’s Mountain Dining Department worked side-by-side with B&B volunteers to help with the meal’s setup, serving and cleanup.
“It is our pleasure to help out the community at Bread & Broth” said Steve Turner, director of Mountain Dining. “Being in the food and beverage business, this is truly my favorite event to serve.”
Joining Steve were Veronica Arriaga, catering manager; Amy Hurford, administrative assistant and Steve Kremer, assistant director Mountain Dining. The Heavenly volunteer crew arrived at St. Theresa Church’s Grace Hall at 3pm and at 6pm they were still asking Sandy Bobman, B&B’s volunteer coordinator, “What can we do to help?”.
“All Heavenly volunteers are excellent”, said Bobman. “We always look forward to working with them.”
Bread & Broth thanks Heavenly for their monthly sponsorships and their genuine concern for the community. Kudos to Heavenly Mountain Resort for the part they play in B&B’s success in feeding the needy of our community.
To help B&B as a donor or sponsor, please contact me at (530) 542.2876 or carolsgerard@aol.com.
Carol Gerard, Bread & Broth
The thing I love most about South Lake Tahoe, is the true sense of Community Spirit! Thanks to the Heavenly volunteers, and all the other volunteers who share their time, energy (& money) to help others . The SLT Community steps up to help those in need of medical, financial and emotional support through many adversities. Kindness never gets old or out-of-date!
His name was Mike. Every week Mike would go to local churches to get free food. Mike learned from other homeless persons where to go. There was Saint Teresa’s on Monday, another church beside Sierra Blvd. on another day, and still another church beside Kingsbury Grade, on still another day. Mike would go to Christmas Cheer and find free clothes, and more free food. Mike had other angles to get free stuff. I offered work to Mike and he refused. Mike received food stamps. Mike told me how much credit for food was put on his credit card each week and it didn’t take long to do the math and learn that the government food program gave Mike more free food than I bought for myself. And that didn’t count the free food Mike was receiving at the churches. Mike would regularly buy the high priced ice cream instead of the cheap stuff that I bought. Mike would buy Doritos, the highest priced corn chips, then offer me some. Mike lived in a van. To get cash Mike would gather recyclables. There were other men like Mike, and they would share information about where the free food was being handed out. I went to Saint Teresa’s once to see for myself what they did. I was glad no one recognized me. Mike learned where he could park his van at night without being bothered while he slept. In the morning Mike would awake and go have coffee. Then at about noon, his daily routine would begin again. I knew Mike over a twelve year period and Mike never looked for work. Everything I’ve written here (except the name ) is very true.
Pizza, generalize much? Do you really believe that everyone who is homeless is “Mike”?
I’m telling you this one story about one man, while I know this is true. What should catch your attention about this story is that I knew the man long before the economic crisis depleted job opportunities. The economy was booming ten years ago, and this guy never worked a day. Instead he chose to live off of people’s hand outs. If you think the beggars at the parking lots are good people, go get to know a few and tell us what you learned. I’m telling you what I learned.
Even if everything said here about Mike is true, the food programs fill a desperate need for hungry families. Almost 25% of children in America are food insecure and go to school hungry. In a wealthy nation where we throw away 40% of food that is purchased, having people go hungry is a shameful crime. I hope local businesses and families consider funding a Bread and Broth meal this holiday season so that others can eat as we do at least once in a while.
Pizza eater is correct there are quite a number of people that are lazy or are scammers of the system(by no means am I talking about people who truely need the assistance) I personnally know of about 15 people in South Lake Tahoe that are scamming the system. Some are collecting disability income and food stamps while working off the books for an additional 1500 a month part time.
THANKS RELOMAN – – – I’m glad you didn’t run from the truth. In this politically correct society, its gotten more difficult to speak the truth. It’s a real problem separating those whom are deserving from those whom are not. Our government assistance programs don’t separate the two, and that’s a serious problem.
When businesses and corporations game the system to the tune of billions of dollars a year we consider it shrewd business practices.
But when a SMALL percentage of welfare recipients do it, it’s the end of the world as we know it.
Hey BIGGERPICTURE – – – – We part when you assume that a small percentage of people are scamming the system. I have sat and talked with the people at our local coffee shops. That’s where I met Mike, a very intelligent man. Once I learned more about him I learned he was a lazy bum. These bums were telling the other bums where to go to get free handouts. I know this because I sat there listening to their conversations. When these bums leave the mountain during winter, I worry they’ll tell other bums to come to S. Lake Tahoe. They’ll tell other bums “There are plenty of handouts in S. Lake Tahoe, you should go to South Lake Tahoe during the summer. It’s great.” This is a bigger problem than you think.
No one is saying that scamming the goverment by the big guys or the little guys is right. All should be investigated. But the politicians from both side dont want to do anything about it. Dont blame just the Republicans, the Demos do it also. About 10%(or more) of medicare claims are fraud. This is no small thing. What I really hate about goverment is that they call things budget cuts when they really arent. To you and me a cut is this year I spend 100 dollars and next year I reduce my spending to 90 dollars and keep it there for the next decade. At the budget for the next decade after the cuts on each of the line items you can bet there was a increase over the decade. This is because they havent cut the budget as we would call it but rather they have cut the budget that they wanted it to be with increases. The Democrats could have could have done a lot of cuts like Farm aid and oil companies within obamaas first two years like they did with healthcare. You have to ask yourself if america really wants change why did the dems loose control of the house at Obamas mid term election, its because the Tea party came into being because people were dissatified. Obama should have gained control in the last election but he couldnt because America does not want either party in control.
HEY RELOMAN – – I agree with everything you just said. Both parties are to blame for what is happening in government. I’m paying attention like you are. The congress and senate’s main priority is getting re-elected; And that’s a big problem. If there was a bill requiring more control over food stamps, welfare, and other government handouts, they’d vote the bill down for fear they’d lose votes at the next election.