East Central Kansas Area Agency on Aging Nutrition Program has announced it will participate in the 19th annual March for Meals – a month-long, nationwide celebration of Meal on Wheels and senior neighbors who rely on this essential service. ECKAAA Nutrition Program’s celebration will include various activities throughout the month of March.
ECKAAA Nutrition program serves six counties in Kansas including Anderson, Coffey, Franklin, Linn, Miami, and Osage. In those counties there are 24 nutrition sites. The program delivers meals to these sites three to five days a week; the number of meals that goes out daily is about 700, not including frozen meals delivered for weekends. The program serves the most vulnerable population in this area, who depend on the meals to remain healthy and independent at home, now even more so amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
The annual March for Meals celebration commemorates the historic day in March of 1972 when President Nixon signed into law a measure that amended the Older Americans Act of 1965 to include a national nutrition program for seniors 60 years and older. Since 2002, community-based Meals on Wheels programs from across the country have joined forces for the annual awareness campaign to celebrate this successful public-private partnership and garner the support needed to fill the gap between the seniors served and those still in need.
“The pandemic has introduced many of us to the newfound and harsh realities of food insecurity and social isolation – something that far too many seniors experience as their daily norm,” said Ellie Hollander, president and CEO of Meals on Wheels America. “More than ever, we must rally around our essential community-based programs that serve as lifelines to a growing number of people in need, to enable their own long-term vitality. Even when we make it through this unprecedented time in our nation’s history, there will still be millions of vulnerable older adults who will rely on that familiar knock on the door that provides peace of mind and hope beyond the meal itself. Please join us in celebrating the power and importance of Meals on Wheels this March and always.”
For more information on how to volunteer, contribute or speak out for the seniors in your community this March, visit ECKAAA at www.eckaaa.org to find local senior nutrition sites, or learn more about supporting the Meals on Wheels program through volunteering or monetary donations.
To see the local nutrition sites’ daily menu, click here: Osage County Nutrition Sites Daily Menu
OSAGE CITY, Kan. – Karl E. Brewer, 68, passed away Saturday, Feb. 27, 2021, at home in Osage City, Kan. Karl Eric Brewer was born Nov. 4, 1952, in Sunnyside, Wash., the son of Derald and Barbara (Bellanger) Brewer.
