Las Vegas Weekly

Lose weight for charity

Pound for Pound challenge ties weight loss to donations for hunger relief organizations

Step on it. Pledge a few. Lose it all. Feed the hungry.

Photo: Wader / via Flickr

$1.40.

That’s how much money local hunger-relief organization Three Square will earn for the 10 pounds of holiday feasting and workout slacking I’ve pledged to banish from my thighs and belly this winter.

That’s how much it’s worth to wean myself off Jarlsberg and not sample every new seasonal flavor that the folks at Ben and Jerry’s dream up and illustrate so temptingly. (I reserve the right to indulge in Coffee Heath Bar Crunch, however. Some things are sacred.) It’s resolution time, and mine’s going to benefit a cause other than fitting back into my skinny jeans.

Three Square is one of more than 200 food banks that has teamed up with NBC’s The Biggest Loser and charitable organization Feeding America to participate in the Pound for Pound Challenge, a nation-wide anti-hunger drive to help Americans lose weight while feeding the hungry. For every pound that participants pledge to shave off between now and June 30, 2010, sponsors like Yoplait, MultiGrain Cheerios, Subway and 24 Hour Fitness will donate $0.14 to Feeding America. For Southern Nevadans who sign up to slim down, that money will funnel right back into their local community via Three Square.

So far, more than 7,600 people have gone to pfpchallenge.com and pledged to trim more than 2 million pounds this spring. Last year more than 3.5 million pounds were pledged through Pound for Pound.

My $1.40 will provide about four full meals to Southern Nevadans in need, a tiny dent in the vast food deficit plaguing our community. In 2009, Three Square collected about 17 million pounds of food for hungry locals, but that’s nowhere near where the two-year-old charity wants to be. Based on U.S. Census figures and recent unemployment statistics, Three Square Marketing Director Cheryl Bella estimates Southern Nevadans will need about 49 million pounds of food this year. “We know the need has increased,” she said.

Bella adds that Pound for Pound works on “the honor system.” There’s no June weigh-in to assess your actual weight loss. In other words, they’re giving you the benefit of the doubt that you’ll actually stick to you New Year’s resolution this time around. After all, someone’s paying for it. So do me a favor — if you see me eying that extra-large pack of Jarlsberg at Vons anytime soon, kindly remind me of those 10 pounds I’ve vowed to kick. Sometimes it takes a village to lose a dress size.