Free community suppers have been canceled, and Meals on Wheels has adjusted procedures but is still working hard to meet the needs of the region’s food insecure senior citizens, who are especially vulnerable to complications from the COVID-19 virus.
Meals on Wheels closed its 19 community dining sites in the county, including the Ronald A. Philbrick Elderly Housing at Greenville Falls building, Antrim Village in Antrim and the Bond Wellness Center at the Monadnock Community Hospital in Peterborough. St. Joseph Community Services Vice President Jon Eriquezzo said that the county’s branch of Meals on Wheels has converted most of the community dinners to home delivery, or to grab and go meals for clients. On Thursday, the program will only deliver frozen and shelf-stable meals in lieu of their usual hot options, he said. This isn’t Eriquezzo’s first epidemic: he was working at Crotched Mountain Rehabilitation Center when the H1N1 virus hit, he said. “The public wasn’t very engrossed, but hospitals and rehab centers were involved,” he said.
The organization recently ordered 16,000 frozen and shelf-stable meals, which amounts to about two weeks worth of food for the county’s meal recipients, Eriquezzo said. “When we have clients who are quarantined, then they’ll have 14 days worth of food,” he said, and program volunteers will call to make wellness checks instead of visiting. Volunteers are already encountering clients under mandatory quarantine, Eriquezzo said. They are now instructed to call ahead and ask if they can leave meals on the front door. If not, they have the recipient step back six feet, and leave the meal on the table and ask how the client is doing.
How does one order 16,000 meals? “It’s not easy,” Eriquezzo said. 8,000 meals came from Maine-based Birch Stream Farms, which previously only provided the program with medically tailored meals. “The meals were great by the way,” he said. The rest come from Trio Community Meals, the program’s regular caterer, which is ramping up its production of frozen and shelf-stable meals over hot options.
Shelf-stable meals aren’t like military Meals Ready to Eat, Eriquezzo said. They’re served in a wrapped styrofoam tray the way meat is packaged at a grocery store, and filled with items that keep, like a can of soup and cheese and crackers. They come in several day supplies.
“Our staff is very strained right now,” Eriquezzo said. Most Meals on Wheels volunteers are over 60, Eriquezzo said, and many are afraid to come to work. The frozen, prepackaged meals ought to ease the strain, he said. “I don’t need volunteers to be crowded in a room,” packaging meals, he said. They will likely also reduce delivery days to just three days a week, but provide additional food for every day without a delivery, he said.
Donations are the best way to help Meals on Wheels right now, Eriquezzo said. “These 16,000 meals I had to order, that was $60,000 that we didn’t plan on,” he said, and that he expects to have to order just as many in another week or two.
On the bright side, Eriquezzo said he’s received “fantastic” support from representatives from municipalities, cities, and the state and federal government, all of whom call him to ask what the program needs. Over the past week, Meals on Wheels was able to fill its needs for additional volunteers and hand sanitizer, he said. The latest federal COVID-19 response package included an additional $500 million for Meals on Wheels and other nutrition service programs.
Meals on Wheels serves about 1,450 meals a day in Hillsborough County. “For 21 percent of our population, we’re the only people they see all week,” Eriquezzo said. He knows of other home-based services that have suspended operations since COVID-19 closures began. “I suspect that people are relying upon us even more,” he said.
The program has been receiving requests from people who have been quarantined, but don’t necessarily qualify for Meals on Wheels. “We’re evaluating all those cases individually,” Eriquezzo said, and will either provide services or refer the applicants to a different program that can meet their needs.
Volunteers from the Community Church of Francestown offered their help to residents who need assistance with chores or errands last weekend, setting up a soup truck to deliver to residents.
Cher Barker and Lori Hardwick-Way are coordinating more than 20 volunteers to complete everyday non-medical tasks for Francestown residents, such as running errands or shopping during the pandemic.
The soup truck delivered to 11 families, Barker said. The idea came in response to people “feeling more alone than they need to feel,” during the epidemic, she said, whether they’re residents living alone or with large families. “You get hung up on it, you get worried… Will I ever see my grandchildren again? That’s a horrible feeling,” she said. The hardest part, she said, is helping people to know they can ask for help.
“Some people, I’m sure, are wary and that’s fine. We are all wary,” Barker said. After last weekend’s deliveries, Barker chose to self-quarantine, so the soup truck is on hold for now.
Contact Barker (547-6866) or Hardwick-Way (588-2978) if you need or can provide vital assistance to Francestown residents.
Although Peterborough’s Unitarian Universalist Church and Union Congregational Church have canceled community suppers, All Saints’ Church is proceeding with Tuesday community suppers to go. Volunteers deliver meals to-go for visitors who park in the church’s lower parking lot on Concord Street, according to the church’s Facebook page.