Las Vegas Town Fridge: The Inspiration

With record levels of food insecurity due to the pandemic, one local team is working to address this issue here at home through their Las Vegas Town Fridge project. 

John Thomas Chou, along with three friends – Jason Chiang, Jarred Garcia, and Kelli Hsu  – saw communities here in Las Vegas suffering from food insecurity and decided to take action by beginning their efforts to install a community fridge in an area of low to very low food security. 

The USDA defines Food insecurity in one of two ways:

• Low food security (old label = Food insecurity without hunger); Reports of reduced quality, variety, or desirability of diet. Little or no indication of reduced food intake.

• Very low food security (old label = Food insecurity with hunger); Reports of multiple indications of disrupted eating patterns and reduced food intake.

With current projections, it’s estimated that “at some point this year, 54 million Americans — including one in four children — may not know where their next meal is coming from” [Marketplace]. And Nevada is one of the states looking at severe food insecurity. 

Food insecurity can lead to a host of problems, both mentally and physiologically. And it causes lifelong illnesses like heart disease, cancer, and diabetes [WebMD].  

Addressing Food Insecurity in the Community

Chou, working on outreach and awareness for the organization, became interested in food insecurity after volunteering with local food banks during the pandemic. These included Three Square and their partners while he worked on getting into medical school.

One issue Chou saw while volunteering was too much food coming in and not enough means to distribute it. 

“There was a high volume of food coming in, but not enough people who were able to come take it. This resulted in lots of leftover food,” Chou shared. “One day I had to throw away several shopping carts of food that was going bad.”

Part of this issue is that many food-insecure households lack reliable transportation to get to a food bank. This lack of transportation is also exacerbated because many of these families also live in food deserts. These are areas where people have limited access to a variety of healthy and affordable food, [USDA].  

On top of seeing these issues first-hand through volunteering, Chou also has an educational background relating to it as well. 

“I studied Physiological Sciences & minored in Food Studies at UCLA and graduated [in] 2019,” he shared. “I started off with working in food justice through a bunch of service-learning classes, working in community gardens, and really started making mental connections about the food system, thanks to an internship at Food Forward.”

Chou wanted to take the resources and information he learned and turn it into an effort to address food insecurity first-hand. And the issues that the pandemic has worsened, particularly relating to income and housing, have fed directly into food insecurity.

The Creation of the Fridge

Inspired by this increased need for action and a desire to help the community, the L.V. Town Fridge launched their project in July 2020.

Prior to the launch, Chou stated that he spent some time researching the effectiveness of redistribution efforts to help food scarcity, circulating food around, and reducing food waste.  

After researching these topics, Chou then identified three major things he needed to accomplish before the fridge opened officially. 

One – they needed a fridge. Two – they needed a location for it. And three – they needed permission from the Southern Nevada Health District. 

Until about a week ago, the organization had the fridge, approval from SNHD, and sought a refrigerator location. 

“We actually just got a location at United Movement of Organized Kindness!” Chou said in a follow-up after the initial interview. “They’re amazing, and we’ll be planning on setting the fridge up soon!”

UMOK is an organization working to assist a network of charities, churches, and schools. They supply them with the tools they need to serve our communities.

Chou went on to say that L.V. Town Fridge landed a partnership with Postmates. Now, “local restaurants can opt to donate meals directly to the fridge!”

The Ideal Spot

Before finding the location, Chou said he wanted to find a location with a lot of foot traffic, like the Downtown area.

“There’s a high rate of food insecurity down there,” Chou explained. He touched on the peripheral issue of homelessness in the community, which also worsened during the pandemic.

While the location they’ve been granted isn’t where Chou originally inquired, it’s still fairly close to Downtown in an area of high food security. UMOK, located off of Main Street and Washington Avenue, serves the homeless community in that area.  

Referring back to the initial interview, Chou went on to explain how he imagines the community fridge would operate. 

“The idea is for people to drop off food at the location for others, trade food there, and have food available to those without any.”

“We’ll need volunteers to check daily to see what’s taken, what’s left, and what’s needed; to clean the fridge; to throw out expired food; reach out to local grocery stores to see about donating food,” Chou said, outlining some of the next steps for the fridge.

Chou then shared some ways to help out L.V. Town Fridge as they grow their reach in the community. 

“The coolest thing I noticed recently is how many people have been spreading the word and sharing us on Instagram. It’s been motivating us to keep going after the idea and build it from there,” he said. 

#GetinMotion with the Las Vegas Town Fridge

Once the fridge is up, Chou said that the best way to help is to donate food and volunteer.

“Take those extra 10 minutes after work and drive down to donate food, if you can.”

Chou is also looking for someone to help him figure out how to construct an insulated shelter to protect the fridge from the summer heat. And he’s looking for artists who’d want to decorate the fridge.

While the team works on a website, Chou shared that people can sign up to volunteer through their form.

Looking to the Future

In terms of the future outlook, Chou said the goal is to remove themselves from the fridge; they want to put it into the hands of the community. 

“Our hope is that eventually, we’ll plant the seed for other people to set up their own community fridges in other areas and work with them or inspire them to see that it’s possible,” he said. “We want to be an example for others to see how possible it is to be bigger than yourself; be part of something bigger than yourself; advocate for something bigger than yourself.”  

Chou concluded by sharing how his volunteer experience and the work through setting up the L.V. Town Fridge has helped him identify the paths he wants to take in his career. 

“With applying to be a doctor, everything that I’ve learned through the community activism I’ve been doing has formed how I want to approach practicing medicine,” Chou said. “The relationships I’ve formed with people – it’s all related and dependent on each other. Everyone gets something out of it at the end of the day.”

You can help out the Las Vegas Town Fridge by following them on Instagram and checking out their LinkTree periodically for updates.