Home-delivered meals programs tap unusual resources

Aging, Fall, 1994

Thanks to the 350,000 volunteers who help prepare and deliver Meals on Wheels, over 1 million homebound people across the country get a hot meal every day. However, with many more women in the labor force and older people returning to work to supplement their incomes, the pool of traditional volunteers has grown smaller. As a result, service agencies have come up with unique strategies to maintain and expand their home-delivered meals programs.

Corporations Allow Lunchtime Deliveries

Corporations in Huntsville, Alabama -- home to NASA's space shuttle and space stations programs -- not only look to the skies, but also take to county roads to deliver meals to elderly residents. The Huntsville Meals on Wheels Task Force -- a partnership of individuals, churches, clubs, civic groups, and businesses -- has succeeded in mobilizing so many volunteers in local corporations that the amount of elderly clients now receiving hot meals each day has doubled (from 100 to 200 in the last five years), according to Ingrid Baris, director of Homebound Services, Huntsville-Madison County Senior Center. Corporations as huge as Boeing and McDonnell Aircraft and as small as one or two-person law firms, as well as members of the Corps of Army Engineers and employees at NASA participate in the program.

Each corporation has its own route and manages its own delivery team. The arrangement at Teledyne Brown Engineering Company is typical. A team captain schedules one employee to spend his or her lunch hour delivering meals to 12 homebound clients along a 10-mile route. Enough employees have signed up so that each puts in only about one or two days a month. Even with such sporadic contact, corporate workers develop affectionate, long-term relationships with their clients, for whom their Meals on Wheels carrier may be the only person they will see that day, says Baris.

The Huntsville Meals-on-Wheels Task Force was one of 10 programs nationwide that received a Community Achievement Award in 1990 from former AoA Commissioner Dr. Joyce Berry. The award honors communities that have succeeded in tapping the resources of the local private sector to help expand services to their elderly citizens. For more information about Huntsville's program, contact Ingrid Baris, Director of Homebound Services, Huntsville-Madison County Senior Center, 22201 Clinton Avenue, Huntsville, Alabama; phone: (205) 534-1553.

Public Assistance Recipients Prepare Meals

Rome Kitchen is a project in Utica, New York, that trains public assistance recipients to prepare meals used for both congregate meal sites and home-delivered meals. Begun in 1989, the project is a joint venture of the Oneida County Office for the Aging, the Cosmopolitan Community Center, and the Deparment of Social Services. Training includes three weeks in class at a vocational institution and three weeks of on-the-job training.

The Department of Social Services provides funding for the building, equipment, and training costs; the Office for the Aging provides staff for planning, proposal writing, and development of training curricula; and Cosmopolitan Community Center administers the training contract.

The program at Rome Kitchen benefits both agencies: for the Office for the Aging, it provides an efficient contracting process as well as adequately funded nutrition services, and for the Department of Social Services, the program provides on-the-job training, reference material, and a 72% employment rate after the program. Many trainees continue to work in the Rome Kitchen and others find jobs in local restaurants, hospitals, and schools. For more information about the Rome Kitchen, contact Jim Blackshear at Cosmopolitan Community Center, (315) 735-7525.

Youths Help Elderly Neighbors

In an effort to expand its volunteer base, the National Meals on Wheels Foundation (NMOWF) has begun a Youth Volunteer Initiative to recruit and educate youth to serve as volunteers and advocates for the elderly. Besides meal delivery, the goal of the program is to help young people understand the experience of aging and teach them how to influence public policy regarding senior issues. The initiative consists of $10,000 seed grants to the following demonstration projects:

* Jamaica Service Program for Older Adults, Jamaica, New York, is training 20 minority teenagers to serve as volunteers and advocates for 10 homebound elders currently receiving Meals on Wheels. The youths will also write reports summarizing the support needs of their clients and present these reports to state legislators in Albany.

* Executive Office of Elder Affairs, Boston, Massachusetts, is using inner-city youths to deliver a week's supply of food to seniors who are identified as at risk for malnutrition. The youths will present their report to the Massachusetts Association of Older Americans, a seniors' political action group.

* Seldovia Village Tribe, Seldovia, Alaska, pairs young volunteers with frail elders in an "adopt a grandparent" project. The volunteers help their "grandparent" with chores, errands, and other needs.