CLEARFIELD – The Clearfield County Commissioners on Tuesday proclaimed March as the 19th annual March for Meals Month at the request of the county’s Area Agency on Aging (CCAAA).
The proclamation was requested by Joan Bracco, marketing coordinator and ombudsman, and Julie Fenton, director of education and community service for CCAAA, with the commissioners still being unable to help deliver Meals on Wheels as part of this month’s program due to COVID-19 concerns.
On March 22, 1972, President Richard Nixon signed into law a measure that amended the Older Americans Act of 1965, establishing a national nutrition program for seniors who are 60 years and older.
Meals on Wheels America began its March for Meals campaign in 2002 to recognize this historic month; the importance of the Older Americans Act Nutrition Programs, both congregate and home-delivered; and to raise awareness about senior hunger in America.
In 2021, the program celebrates 19 years of providing an opportunity to support Meals on Wheels programs that deliver vital and critical services by donating, volunteering and raising awareness about senior hunger and isolation.
Meals on Wheels programs – both congregate and home-delivered – have admirably served communities for nearly 50 years in Pennsylvania and for over 35 years in Clearfield County. “Our drivers are our backbone,” expressed Bracco.
Fenton agreed, saying their delivery of hot meals, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, was literally “lifelines” for the county’s seniors over the past year.
“Our drivers see them five days a week. They see what they need, how they are doing,” she said, “and if there’s something – as an agency – we can do or provide for them.
“We’re so blessed that our drivers have gone day-in and day-out through this entire pandemic to deliver meals and blizzard boxes (shelf-stable meals in the event of meal cancellations due to inclement weather).”
At the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic last March, Fenton said drivers delivered close to 900 hot meals daily. Meal deliveries now fluctuate somewhere between 700 to 800 daily.
“Sometimes, it’s the only hot meal they get. The driver’s face might be the only one they see, so it does help with isolation and depression,” she said.
Commissioner Tony Scotto, who has participated in March for Meals program in the past, expressed that it was so much more than a home-delivered meal. He described how the seniors’ face light up at the sight of their driver.
“… They make sure everything is OK, ask about their family,” Scotto said, to which Fenton added: “that’s why its Meals on Wheels and ‘More.’”
Following the reading of the proclamation and its approval, Commissioner Dave Glass asked if CCAAA could partner with Penn Highlands Healthcare or another entity to ensure the county’s homebound seniors can receive the COVID vaccine.
Fenton said the Susquehanna Wellness Clinic, Frenchville, has applied for and is hopeful to receive the vaccine. She said its medical staff will go into homes to administer the shots; CCAAA will also help with transportation to the clinic.
She said if the clinic would – for some reason – not receive the vaccine, the agency will make sure any senior who wishes to have the vaccine gets one.
Currently, she said CCAAA staff have been contacting all its consumers and creating a database of seniors who have not received a vaccine yet, but would like one.
Glass said he’d contact state officials, and make a case for smaller healthcare providers to receive supplies of the vaccine, as well. “I don’t want these people left behind.”