FISH food fundraising kicks into high gear

The Carson City Elks Lodge is hoping to give Friends in Service Helping the bird this holiday season - in fact the goal is more than one.

Elks Lodge No. 2177 is working with FISH for an inaugural "turkey roundup."

Residents can drop off frozen turkeys at the lodge, 515 N. Nevada St., from 2-9 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday until Nov. 22.

The turkeys will be delivered to FISH daily and kept in their freezers until needed. If there are any turkeys left after Thanksgiving, they will be saved for Christmas.

"We saw that FISH was collecting the dry goods, but they said that turkeys were hard to come by and thought we'd help," said Nita Yeager, Elks Lodge trustee.

The drive is one of several this time of year where FISH partners with other agencies to help provide food for those in need. They recently completed a canned food drive with local schools that garnered more than 52,000 cans of food.

The 22nd annual Trick-or-Treat for FISH Food Drive encourages area public and parochial schools to collect food for families in need.

Carson Middle School was the top producer with 23,280 cans. Hillary Mendeguila, an eighth-grade teacher at Carson Middle School, led all classrooms by collecting 17,586 cans. She received a $2,000 award from area organizations.

The Sertoma Club donates $1,000 to the drive, which is divided among the top three grade schools in the district. Fremont Elementary School claimed the $400 first prize, Fritsch took second and Bordewich-Bray placed third. Mark Twain and Empire each won ice cream parties for their leading classrooms.

The parochial schools generated 6,480 cans with St. Teresa of Avila Catholic School producing the most. St. Teresa's students averaged 23 cans per student.

FISH channeled about $2,300 in award grants from Rotary International, Sertoma Club and Ron Kendall to the Parent Teacher Associations in participating schools.

Among the PTAs receiving awards were St. Teresa, Seeliger Elementary, Bethlehem Lutheran and Capital Christian.

• Contact reporter Jarid Shipley at jshipley@nevadaappeal.com or 881-1217.