Full plates, full hearts: Mizell Center kitchen triples in size to better serve as a lifeline to those in need

Tucked away behind an interior door in the back of what used to be Palm Springs Fire Station 2 is a crew still saving lives. On Thursday, that crew celebrated the most essential tool they use — a remodeled and vastly expanded kitchen.

Members of Chef Aaron Nava’s five-person team are lifesavers for more than just visitors to the Mizell Center, which moved into the city-owned building off South Sunrise Way in the 1980s. They prepare, plate, and box roughly 800 meals each weekday, including 500 delivered to homebound seniors along seven routes from Whitewater to the Salton Sea thanks to the efforts of a 16-member team.

“It’s a great crew,” Nava said while whirling around the kitchen in what is now known as the Anastacia Angel Nutrition Center. “Everybody works really hard. I couldn’t ask for anything more, to be honest.”

While he didn’t ask for the 650-square-foot kitchen that came with the building 70 years ago to be expanded, that’s what he got. After working at the Neuro Vitality Center off East Alejo Road for the past year, Nava and team walked into a 1,834-square-foot kitchen, complete with state-of-the-art appliances, more storage, and above all, more space, earlier this month.

That’s what both current and former elected and appointed city leaders hoped to help deliver when they approved using $500,000 of the city’s Measure J funds to help complete the $1.3 million project. Some of them were on hand Thursday, along with major donors and Mizell staff and board members, as the kitchen was formally dedicated with a ceremonial ribbon cutting.

“Having to serve thousands of meals from a kitchen the size of a walk-in closet was amazing,” said Palm Springs Mayor Pro Tem Jeffrey Bernstein, who previously chaired the Measure J Commission. “The fact that this came to the Measure J Commission less than two years ago and it has already come to reality in such a short time is a miracle.”

During remarks before the ribbon cutting, current Measure J Commission Chair Naomi Soto referred to the kitchen project as “a true success story and accomplishment,” but also an example of how collecting one penny of every retail dollar spent in the city — allowed via the Measure J tax first approved in 2011 — can provide lasting benefits to the wider community.

Since its inception, more than $170 million has been collected via the tax. That money has gone to helping more than 100 projects come to life, but also toward the upkeep of city roadways.

“Every time you spend a dollar in Palm Springs, that money comes to us and allows us to help do things like this,” Mayor Grace Garner told the audience Thursday while reminding them that a majority of the one penny that’s collected comes from visitors.

Helping more people who make their home in the desert is what Mizell Center staff is focused on now that the kitchen is open. That greater need was identified during the pandemic when Mizell became a vital lifeline for those quarantined inside their homes. From March 2020 through March 2021, nutrition staff at Mizell prepared and distributed more than 230,000 meals — the most prepared in 12 months in the center’s history.

“The overarching goal is that no Coachella Valley senior goes hungry,” said Wes Winter, Mizell’s executive director. “That’s always been the goal and always will be.”

However, Winter explained, as other organizations approached them and asked to use the kitchen or hire the staff to prepare meals for their clients, “we always had to say no.” The expanded kitchen now allows Mizell to consider assisting those organizations, perhaps for a fee, which will help raise additional funds for the core mission.

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