For David Wheeler and Lisa Kasyan, sitting over their Thanksgiving meal at Catholic Charities of Southern Nevada was a chance to reflect. Wheeler sipped on hot chocolate and remembered his grandmother’s homemade chocolate pudding. Kasyan recalled the first dessert she made for Wheeler — a fried pineapple dish with hot raspberry sauce.
“That was the first dessert I ever made for him. I said, ‘You ain’t going nowhere!’” Kasyan joked.
“I miss her cooking, really,” Wheeler said.
The couple, both 62, moved to Las Vegas in May from Tennessee and had never been to a free Thanksgiving meal service before. It meant “everything,” Wheeler said, to have the traditional feast on Thursday before returning to a parking lot on Main Street where they stay while awaiting a more permanent housing solution.
Catholic Charities and 50 volunteers served roughly 700 of Las Vegas’ most vulnerable men, women and children for their 59th annual free holiday feast at St. Lied Vincent Dining Facility. Familiar faces in the volunteer line included Mayor-elect Shelley Berkley, Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford and Raiders cornerback Nate Hobbs.
The meal included roasted turkey, mashed potatoes, corn bread stuffing and green bean casserole — 300 pounds of each, to be precise. Not to mention tens of gallons of gravy, cranberry sauce and hot cocoa, plus 700 slices of pumpkin pie.
It’s only a sliver of what is needed to help alleviate hunger in Southern Nevada. Deacon Tom Roberts, president and CEO of Catholic Charities of Southern Nevada, said the organization’s food pantry also gave away 3,300 turkeys and fixings this month.
“People’s edge of economic problems is really affected by a couple of points of inflation,” Roberts said. “What’s an aggravation maybe for you and me, for them, it’s the difference between, ‘Do I have enough food or can I afford to do something like this?’ So we’ll see more, sadly, families here today than we normally do, because parents are trying to do what we all do, which is take care of our families.”
Volunteer Humberto Trueba said he and his family have volunteered for holiday meals the last five years. He stayed in Las Vegas for work while his family went out of town for the holiday — but still made time for the work and reward of supporting the feast.
“You spend a lot of time cleaning and doing stuff, but at the end of the day, you feel rewarded, feel like you did something for the community,” Trueba said. “Our community right now is going through a lot. It has not been easy. And I feel that this is something to give back and to help people.”
For Roberts, the holiday has an additional meaning. He retires next month after 12 years leading the organization.
“It’s an emotional day to come in some ways for me, because I’m so proud of the 300 staff that put their wounds aside every day when they come to work to focus on someone else’s — that’s hard,” Roberts said. “I’ll miss being a part of that. I’ll also miss the connection with clients that saved me. This has made a difference in their lives and that’s what I’ll carry with me.”
Contact McKenna Ross at mross@reviewjournal.com. Follow @mckenna_ross_ on X.
