INDIAN RIVER COUNTY — More than 300 volunteers descended on the Gifford Youth Activity Center’s gym Saturday to help pack 100,000 bags of food to be shipped to hungry children and their mothers in Haiti – the last act of the Ride to Beat Hunger event held by Unitarian Universalist Rev. Scott Alexander and the Vero Beach community.
Rev. Alexander, who rode 3,300 miles cross-country by bicycle earlier this year, rose enough money to split between the Harvest Food and Outreach Center locally and the international Stop Hunger Now organization, which is working to feed Haiti’s school children.
“For 90 percent of these kids, this is the only meal of the day,” said Lee Warren, of Stop Hunger Now.
For several hours, volunteers manned their stations, filling the plastic bags with vitamin packs and scoops of dried soy, vegetable flakes and rice. Once five or six bags were filled, the teams shouted “Runner!” and another volunteer would take the bags to the weigh station to ensure enough food was packed and then seal the bags.
Within a couple minutes of the volunteers getting started, the runners were busy hopping between the two stations.
Maureen Labadie, of the Rotary Club of Vero Beach Oceanside, introduced Rev. Alexander to the Stop Hunger Now organization about a year ago, which sparked his idea for the Ride to Beat Hunger.
“Kids can’t learn if they’re tummies are empty,” Labadie said, adding that the food bags packed on Saturday were going to be flown down to Haiti on Sunday by fellow Rotarian group Rotary Club of Okeechobee.
“I’m just so proud of the Vero Beach community,” Labadie said of how the residents and organizations stepped up to help.
Of those stationed at a filling table were a couple Indian River Charter High School students and a member of the Okeechobee Rotary and her daughter.
Sixteen-year-old Kasia Wake admitted that if not for helping with the meal packing, she’d probably have spent her Saturday morning sleeping in.
She said that she was proud to help the students of Haiti by providing food that would help them improve their school performance.
“It’s important to think about that,” Wake said. “It’s not just us in the world.”
Her sister, Emilka, 14, agreed.
“It feels really good” to help, she said, adding that she knows what it’s like to feel hungry after just a couple of hours.
“It’s really scary to think about” what it’s like to have just one meal a day – if that, she added.
Standing off to the side of the gym, Rev. Alexander took in the sight of the volunteers quickly and eagerly working at their stations, the culminating event of Ride to Beat Hunger.
“It’s a real upper,” he said, adding that he is humbled that there are so many people who are willing to help others in need. “It speaks to the compassion of the Vero Beach people.”
Thinking back over the course of the last year, Rev. Alexander got a little misty-eyed.
“Honestly, I didn’t think we’d raise the money,” he said, explaining that up to the last minute, they were short of the $50,000 goal. “I thought we would fall short.”
Then an angel from his congregation at Unitarian Universalist stepped up and anonymously gave $13,000. The angel was at the meal packing event Saturday, Rev. Alexander said.
“If the angel had not come forward,” he said, this event would not have happened.
Along with raising funds for Stop Hunger Now and packing meals for Haiti, Ride to Beat Hunger benefited Harvest Food and Outreach Center, providing approximately $26,000 to the local organization.
“It’s fabulous,” said Harvest Food and Outreach Center’s Cindy Hejlik, the community relations coordinator. “It’s a true blessing that people care about what we do in the community.”
Hejlik planned to help out at one of the stations Saturday morning but was delayed because organizers ran out of gloves and hairnets to give to volunteers. Supplies later arrived and those who wanted to help were able to do so.
Organizers plan to keep the Ride to Beat Hunger charity up and running, including its website, www.RideToBeatHunger.org, and host annual, more local, rides to raise money to continue the fight against hunger.
“The problem with hunger isn’t going away soon,” said Labadie, “and we want to be on the front line.”
