How Meal Services & Food Recovery are expanding during COVID-19
BY KRISTIN MERRON | June 25, 2020Through holidays, weekends, and during a global pandemic, the Meal Services team at The Stewpot is always working to provide for our friends in need, even when the rest of the world seems to have closed its doors.
For many, this week acknowledged the milestone that it’s now been over 100 days of “quarantining,” sheltering in place, working from home, or some combination of the aforementioned. Even though restrictions have gradually started to lift, we are still faced with the blinding reality that we are all currently living through a global pandemic that doesn’t discriminate on the basis of race, gender, age, education, or socioeconomic background. In the same vein, homelessness has proven that it knows no bounds: just as The Stewpot was founded in 1975 to address the needs of those who found themselves living on the streets, today it is still meeting and serving folks who seek assistance and relief from their circumstances.
When Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins issued the Stay Home Stay Safe order back on March 22, 2020, thousands of businesses and service providers closed their doors. As an essential service provider to this community – providing food, shelter, and social services, and other necessities of life for economically disadvantaged or otherwise needy individuals –Stewpot Meal Services continued to dish out daily meals at The Second Chance Café at The Bridge to those who had nowhere else to turn.
Now, three months later, The Stewpot is proud to acknowledge that, despite the many curve balls they have faced over the course of this pandemic, meal service has held strong, uninterrupted, as a steadfast and reliable offering that folks can count on, even in the direst situations.
Meal Services is the foundational program of The Stewpot. Continuing meal service was never a question of “if,” but instead of “how?” With the safety of clients and staff top of mind, The Stewpot had to make some quick adjustments in order to continue safely serving and providing meals for folks who –without The Stewpot –might go without food. Brenda Snitzer, Executive Director of The Stewpot described the situation in a letter to Stewpot supporters in early March, “the virus is a constant threat to our staff as well as those we serve. With this in mind, we have taken steps to prioritize essential life-saving services at this point, while being mindful of the health and safety of all involved.”
The first change implemented was the suspension of volunteer services due to public health and safety concerns. Stewpot meal services rely heavily on volunteers, with a typical meal requiring an average of 15 volunteers for successful service- totaling roughly 16,000 volunteer slots annually. Without volunteers, The Stewpot faced a huge loss in manpower, which meant the dedicated Meal Services team had to step up to fill multiple roles. This required Stewpot staffers to increase the number of service hours in order to serve the same or an increased number of folks with fewer hands. “With a reduced workforce, we are being forced to be increasingly efficient and creative, but I continue to be amazed by those who are stepping up to the plate daily to care for our most vulnerable,” says Brenda Snitzer “We deeply miss our loyal and faithful volunteers!” While in-person volunteering opportunities remain suspended until further notice, The Stewpot has developed some creative ways for supporters to volunteer virtually. Interested parties can view social-distance-friendly options for engaging with The Stewpot here.
Other immediate adjustments to dining service at The Stewpot Second Chance Café included switching from standard dishes to disposable single-use plates, cups, utensils, and plastic wrap, while reducing the number of guests in the dining room at one time, and suspending at-table water service. Making the necessary switch to all disposable single-use paper products in the dining hall has resulted in one of the largest cost-increases influencing the meal service budget. As the need for these items grows, The Stewpot welcomes continued contributions to support meal services efforts.
Incredibly, without a single gap in service, the dedicated Meal Services team at The Stewpot has continued to serve thousands of people hot, nutritious meals 3 times per day, 7 days per week at the Second Chance Café, helping those experiencing homelessness to stay healthy and strong. Each month during the 2020 coronavirus emergency, The Stewpot meal service at The Bridge has provided approximately 15,000 meals.
Additionally, a combined and organized effort between The Stewpot’s Meal Services, Food Recovery, and Family Stabilization Programs is helping to provide much-needed food items and budget relief to up to 1,200 households experiencing food insecurity each month. Prior to the COVID-19 emergency, The Stewpot’s monthly food distributions would provide a week's worth of groceries to approximately 100 families whose children participate in Stewpot Children and Youth Program. In response to growing community need, The Stewpot has increased these distributions to three times per month, and they now include dedicated slots for any Dallas household seeking support. Along with fresh produce and pantry staples, families are now receiving five family-size pre-made heat-and-serve meals –prepared by Stewpot Meal Services –so that they can spend less time concerned about putting food on the table, and more time gathering around it. Surplus goods captured by The Stewpot Food Recovery team have helped make the additional food distributions for these families possible. Stewpot staff have also stepped in to fill in the gaps for the average 45 volunteers that it takes to help run the Family Stabilization Program’s monthly grocery distribution.
From the end of March through the end of April, in cooperation with the City and the Dallas Public Library, The Stewpot Meal Service team and the librarians were providing food daily to an average of 150 individuals staying outside the downtown library, with help from partners like Highland Park United Methodist Church. In late April, the City of Dallas’ Office of Homeless Solutions began providing day resources at the Kay Bailey Hutchinson Convention Center Shelter, enabling overnight guests to remain at the convention center all day. As part of this effort, individuals staying outside the library were relocated from the plaza of the library to the convention center. Since the transition, The Stewpot Meal Services team has taken on the responsibility of coordinating lunch service 7 days per week to support the daily residents who are utilizing the Kay Bailey Hutchinson Convention Center coronavirus temporary relief shelter. This includes working with collaborative partners to supply, pack and transport sack meals or hot lunches and water bottles to the convention center every day. From April through the end of June, The Stewpot’s combined distribution of meals at the library, convention center, from Chef prepared donated meals and Preston Hollow Catering, and to partner organization Family Gateway amounts to over 14,000 additional meals through these efforts.
Now even with many restaurants re-opening, The Stewpot continues to be blessed by area businesses and restaurants who are closing doors, or choosing to think of others and donating their goods to assist with ongoing meal service efforts as folks continue to be financially impacted as a result of the virus. “This has been hard, it’s been really hard, but it’s also been really, really good!” says Rob Guild, Manager of Food Recovery at The Stewpot. “It’s almost too easy to look at people who are working from home and wish I was doing that, but at the same time I wouldn’t have it any other way. I’m thankful that, with as crazy as everything has been within the past couple of months, I’m able to be on the front lines and see people say ‘Thank You, The Stewpot has helped me.’ When someone walks up to us and says ‘I’m hungry, can you please help?’ It’s such a great feeling to be able to say ‘Yes!’ It feels good to do good.”
In January, The Stewpot Food Recovery team captured roughly 30,000 pounds of donated food. By March, monthly numbers had increased to over 56,000 pounds, and by the end of April that number had grown to over 77,000 pounds per month. It continues to climb. “Distribution centers started calling us because restaurants weren’t buying anything, so we hit a peak in food recovery. The surge has forced us to reassess what we’ve got and what we’re doing with it, so that we throw away as little as possible. If there’s one thing we see a lot of right now, it’s people who need help. So our waste is probably the lowest it’s been, because there are people we can call who are happy to accept the food,” remarks Guild.
Since May 19th, The Stewpot of First Presbyterian Church of Dallas has been a participating faith leader in the Mayor's Milk Initiative –a partnership with Borden Dairy, Dallas ISD, and local faith leaders –to help those in need during the COVID-19 pandemic. Each week, 634 gallons of free milk are dispensed to The Stewpot, benefitting clients of Stewpot Meal Services as well as children and families who are recipients of The Stewpot’s weekly food distributions. “The excess milk has caused us to branch out and find new partners who can benefit from the donated gallons. We’ve even gone out to apartment complexes to hand out the milk. These distributions are helping to bring more awareness to our programs and the folks in the community who need us,” says Guild.
“We’ve been able to become a hub. When we bring in too much food, we can call others and continue the chain of giving back. We’ve been giving more than we’ve been giving in the past, it’s truly a blessing!
— Rob Guild, Manager of Food Recovery at The Stewpot
Thanks to continued donations, excess food has been distributed to partner organizations including Union Gospel Mission, Our Calling, Oak Lawn United Methodist Church, the Dallas Public Library, Family Gateway, Mission Oak Cliff, CitySquare, For the Nations, and Inspired Vision Compassion Center who are all helping to feed those who are hungry. Discussing all the new ways in which The Stewpot is collaborating with others Guild says, “We’ve been able to become a hub. When we bring in too much food, we can call others and continue the chain of giving back. We’ve been giving more than we’ve been giving in the past, it’s truly a blessing!”
With coronavirus shutdowns causing a surge in recovered and donated food, The Stewpot has been utilizing fridge and freezer space at First Presbyterian Church of Dallas while the building remains closed for in-person church services. “On a busy day we can average 4-5 pick-ups. To increase our storage capacity, we’ve had to reinvent how we use our resources. This has caused a lot of people to think outside the box,” says Guild.
Early in the crisis, longtime Stewpot supporters Ben E. Keith stepped in to offer the loan of an 18-wheeler cold storage food trailer for several weeks, while next door neighbor Oncor Electric, in turn, offered the use of their truck dock as a place it could be parked. This has greatly expanded The Stewpot’s onsite capacity for cold food storage while allowing the ability to continue helping other partner agencies with food assistance. Thanks to funding provided by generous donors, The Stewpot was recently able to purchase a forklift, which arrived the first week in May. This unit assists with much of the manual labor required to pick up and haul donated food and has lovingly earned the nickname “The Meal Services Bat-Mobile.”
With more Texas businesses now able to reopen, has food recovery slowed down at all? Guild says “No.” “There’s still less business happening than before, and with reduced traffic, many donors are able to drop off, which saves us time, travel, and logistical expenses normally associated with donation pick-ups.”
So what does the future hold for The Stewpot’s meal service and food recovery efforts? “We’re growing so we’re gonna need more space, cooler and freezer. Currently we have parking spaces in the garage stacked with food crates because we have nowhere else to store them. A storage partner or donation to support additional space would be a huge blessing! With in-person volunteering on-hold for now, our three-man team is boots on the ground. We’ve got a really great team of people who are still here, but we are running hard!” exclaims Guild.
Food donations continue to make a huge difference to clients of The Stewpot while helping to avoid unnecessary waste. If you or someone you know has food to donate The Stewpot Food Recovery team can be reached at (469) 236-0488 or you may contact Rob Guild, Manager of Food Recovery at robg@thestewpot.org