ROGERS — Volunteers with Meals on Wheels of Benton County spent the last week boxing pantry items and moving them out of the former Lakeside Restaurant at Lake Atalanta.
The city’s loan of the building has ended, and Meals on Wheels will be temporarily housed at Grace Baptist Church, 2409 W. New Hope Road, until they can remodel the 2004 S. 13th St. house purchased Friday. The house and church locations are more central and will allow them to serve more clients, said Mike Jeffcoat, vice president of the organization’s board.
It wasn’t the first move for a group that has bounced from location to location since its founding in 1984.
By The Numbers
Threat Of Hunger
According to a Senior Hunger Report Card, 8.3 million seniors faced the threat of hunger in the U.S. in 2010. Arkansas ranked third highest in food insecurity for seniors according to the foundation’s survey percentages.
• Mississippi: 21.5 percent
• New Mexico: 21.2 percent
• Arkansas: 19 percent
• Texas 18 percent
• Tennessee: 17.5 percent
• Alabama: 17.2 percent
• Georgia: 17.1 percent
• South Carolina: 17.1 percent
• Florida: 16.6 percent
• Nevada: 16.5 percent
Source: Meals On Wheels Research Foundation 2010 Report
“We’ve been kind of like gypsies,” Jeffcoat said. “Through the years we’ve just kind of moved from pillar to post. We’ve landed here longer than anywhere.”
The Lakeside building has been home to the group for seven years, said Don Glore, board secretary. When the city allowed them to borrow the restaurant building, they were also given a half-acre of property, formerly part of the Miller farm in the 2000 block of South 13th Street. As the deadline for their move arrived they asked Lori Rogers, owner of the adjoining property, if she would consider selling. Rogers, a Pea Ridge business owner, agreed to owner-finance the purchase.
Board members said they estimate purchase and remodeling of the house to cost $100,000 spread across a six-year contract. The board is waiting for a Tuesday hearing on a conditional use permit from the city before remodeling the house starts.
Volunteer labor will help convert the 1,408-square-foot home into an office and commercial kitchen.
The kitchen’s popcorn ceiling has to be reworked, fireproof sheet rock and a grease trap installed and the room wired and plumbed for industrial equipment. A handicap accessible ramp will go in outside, and the bathroom will be handicapped accessible. A circle drive will allow parking for delivery drivers. The organization is hoping for money to purchase a convection oven, steamer and vent equipment.
They estimate the renovation to take 90 days. The group will store their pantry items at the house during the remodel and the cooks will start work Monday at Grace Baptist Church.
In the next five to seven years, the board hopes to raise money to build a 5,000-square-feet building on the adjoining property the city gave them years ago.
The organization was notified of city plans to remove the Lakeside building Oct. 1 and given a Jan. 1 deadline to move, said Barney Hayes, parks director. Two extensions pushed the date to June 30. The group paid $100 a month for utilities during their Lakeside tenure.
“The building is getting really old. It’s kind of not at a point where we feel like it’s worth any repairs we would need to do,” Hayes said.
The restaurant opened in 1947 and closed in 1995. Hayes said the buildings and pool at Lake Atalanta will demolished, probably this fall. Eventually other buildings could take their place, but those plans are still being developed.
Renovation work at the lake will be financed by the city’s bond issue approved by voters last year.
Floors in the Lakeside kitchen show water damage and places are soft. The roof sags. The kitchen faces a bluff and pieces of the hillside occasionally slam into the back of the building, startling volunteers.
A new facility likely means growth for the program.
Jeffcoat estimates they will have the capacity to serve 150 once they move to the remodeled building. The group now serves 44.
Cook Donna Williams was pleased with the move. Older people need help and a healthy, yet tasty meal, she said.
“They deserve it,” Williams said.
Her sentiment is shared by board members. Most of their clients are seniors or disabled and for many their biggest fear is going to a nursing home, Jeffcoat said. Meals cost, on average, more than $4 but the $3.85 price for meals set in 1984 hasn’t changed to keep costs down for clients. Some cannot afford even that and the group is constantly seeking meal sponsors.
Volunteers do more than deliver meals. They let the dog out, change a light bulb and sometimes fix a plugged drain. Those services help people keep their independence, Jeffcoat said.
“The big part of this is talking to the people when you go out,” Glore said.
Driver Debbie Loveless said clients call her “dear” and invite her in as she delivers meals. On her Tuesday morning run, Loveless took her son Tripp, 8, and daughter Morgan, 7. Tripp met some new dogs and said he liked talking with people.
Sometimes her visit represents the only person a shut-in senior will see in a given day, Loveless said
“You know the people rely on you,” she said. “It keeps you coming back for sure.”
At A Glance
Meals On Wheels
Established in 1984, Meals on Wheels of Benton County, formerly Meals on Wheels of Rogers, has a delivery area within 15 miles radius of Rogers. The nonprofit group isn’t federally subsidized. There are no age or income requirements. Meals cost a donation of $3.85 each. The group raises money though a booth at the Rogers Farmers Market, corporate and church sponsorships and other fundraisers.