Volunteers serving up Thanksgiving feast

People all over the Coachella Valley are spending the day with family and friends. Some even spending the day helping those in need.

Lt. Sean Kelsey, with the Salvation Army, says, “Lot of turkey! We’ve been cooking for days getting ready for it.”

In Cathedral City The Salvation Army served up about 500 meals.

Cristina Flores came to eat with her family. She says, “It’s my first time being here, it’s feels like family, so it’s wonderful and with my first baby even better. I can’t ask for more so I’m happy.”

They served everything from stuffing, mash potatoes, pie, and of course turkey; all of the ingredients of a thanksgiving feast.

Kelsey, says, “A lot of families who it was either a question of paying their rent this month or buying the turkey and all of the fixings, so they come here and have a nice home cooked meal.”

Flores says, “They are nice people, they are so nice people.”

For the people who couldn’t travel, volunteers took Thanksgiving to them.

Kelsey says, “Out of the 40 or 50 volunteers that showed up this morning, about half of them are actually driving their cars out to different locations all across the Coachella Valley to take food to folks that can’t come down here.”

In Palm Springs they took advantage of the warm weather, sitting outside the First Baptist Church.

Ron Fletcher enjoyed having somewhere to go. “i think its pretty nice at least the homeless have somewhere to go,” said Fletcher.

Well in the Desert and their volunteers expected to feed about 400 people.

Arlene Rosenthal, the President of Well in the Desert, says, “While there is one person in need, there is always the need for a person like myself, all the volunteers you see here, people that want to help, to do something for their community and sadly the need is great.”

Taylor Ham, a volunteer, says, “We got pies and we are going to give them away to the tables.”

Taylor and her family are visiting from Lake Tahoe, giving up vacation time to help others.

“Because I want to help people have food,” said Taylor.

“Our daughter just started girl scouts so we decided this would be a good first step introduction to getting her involved in the community,” said Andy Ham.

Fletcher says, “I think its beautiful, I wish the people at there would be more like the people in here.”