Volunteers at the Overton Community Center help sort and box food donations gathered in the community by local boy scouts on Saturday morning during the annual Scouting For Food campaign. Photo courtesy of MeLissa Estes.

By Whitney Donohue

Moapa Valley Progress

Local Boy Scouts teamed up this weekend to gather food donations for this year’s Scouting for Food drive.Hundreds of pounds of food were collected by the Scouts to be used by local charitable groups and the Food Bank at Cappalappa Family Resource Center.

“We had a great year this year,” stated Scouting for Food coordinator, Susan Rose of Overton. “Each year the community comes through.

“One problem we’ve consistently had is the donation of expired food.” Rose continued. “We can’t utilize this food and it has to be thrown away.”

This year there was an abundance of expired food mixed in among the donated food, resulting in a large amount of wasted food, Rose said.

Scouting for Food is an annual food drive sponsored by the Boy Scouts of America. Each November the drive is aimed to increase the food supply in the community food banks before the holidays. Rose has been the organizer of the local event for the last seven years.

About 100 Scouts and their leaders spent over 300 volunteer hours on the event. The donations were brought to the Overton Community Center on Saturday morning so volunteers could sort the food. The food was then placed in boxes to be delivered to the food bank.

Cappalappa Family Resource Center food bank will accept donations of unexpired, non-perishable food throughout the year at their offices on Moapa Valley Boulevard.