When a gunman fired shots in the lobby of the Washington Hilton on April 25th and abruptly ended the White House Correspondents' Dinner before the main course could be served, roughly 2,600 plates of steak and lobster were left sitting untouched in the kitchen. The hotel staff, who worked through the night under what the White House Correspondents Association president later called terrible circumstances, made sure none of it went to waste. Staff freeze dried the steak and lobster to extend their shelf life and donated all 2,600 meals to two local shelters for abused women and children, while the remaining produce was composted and sent to farms for agricultural use. The Washington Hilton spokesperson said the hotel regularly donates unused food from events to local community partners, and this particular weekend was no exception.
WHCA president Weijia Jiang, a senior White House correspondent for CBS News, shared the news in a post on Monday and said the donation was something she wanted people to know about. The shooting, which injured a Secret Service agent who has since survived, interrupted the dinner just after the salad course, sending President Trump, members of Congress, journalists, and more than two thousand guests evacuating from the ballroom. In a moment defined by chaos and fear, the decision by hotel workers to stay through the night, preserve the food carefully, and ensure it reached families in need the next morning stood out as a quiet act of decency that did not have to happen, and happened anyway. The Hilton staff received no small amount of appreciation from people who heard about it, and Jiang's post was shared widely as a reminder that ordinary kindness tends to find its way through even the most difficult nights.
Source: https://people.com/hilton-donates-unserved-whcd-lobsters-steaks-to-local-shelters-11959836
