By Kathy Chaffin
kchaffin@salisburypost.com
Jane Gill and Lou Hamilton arrive at the Downtowner Restaurant by 10:30 a.m. Wednesday to pick up the food for their Rowan County Meals on Wheels route.
The meals, which have been placed in plastic containers and shrink-wrapped like microwavable dinners, are packed in lightweight, insulated coolers. Two Salisbury Post newspapers have been tucked in the top of one for the people who requested them.
That’s good news to this reporter and photographer Jon Lakey, who Gill and Hamilton are graciously allowing to accompany them.
Salisbury Mayor Susan Kluttz was supposed to ride with them for Mayors for Meals Day, but she was sick and wasn’t able to come. The only mayor to participate is Rockwell Mayor Beau Taylor, who is accompanying volunteers on the route in his town.
“Come on, we’re going to leave you,” Gill says as they head out the door.
She’s the designated driver, and Hamilton delivers the meals.
Today, they have seven stops on Route 9, which includes several streets between the Downtowner and Rowan Regional Medical Center.
The two are among several volunteers from Second Presbyter-ian Church of Salisbury, and they’ve been doing a route together for four years.
“She’s not tired of me yet,” Hamilton says.
Gill’s a longtime volunteer, having delivered Meals on Wheels in the summers before she retired as a fourth-grade teacher in the Rowan-Salisbury School System in 1987.
She says she taught school for 41 years “and loved every minute of it.”
Hamilton retired four years ago as an office assistant for the Rowan County Department of Social Services.
They’ve been doing this particular route long enough for Gill to know exactly where to go. Their first stop is on North Fulton, where Hamilton checks the list to see if the recipient has a special order.
Today’s menu, packed in two separate containers, consists of chicken, baked beans, slaw, a roll, pears and milk or juice depending on the recipients’ diets.
A woman greets Hamilton at the door and says thank you, and within minutes, Gill is on to their next stop.
“I’m a good driver,” she says. And Lakey, she adds a little later, is “a pretty good back-seat driver.”
The next stop is an apartment complex on Woodson Street, where Hamilton places the meal inside a cooler outside the door.
Meals on Wheels recipients have an orange card taped to their doors so new volunteers will know they have the correct residence.
John Huffman Jr. comes to the door at the next stop on Holmes Street. Retired from Celanese (now Performance Fibers), he says he enjoys receiving his lunch and the newspaper.
At the next stop on Highland Avenue, Hamilton has instructions to put the meal inside a side porch. She picks up a newspaper in the yard and places it beside the food.
Gill says they usually don’t see this recipient, but he occasionally leaves them a New Testament.
At the next stop on Circle Drive, Hamilton follows the instructions taped on the front door and places the containers on their side inside the screen door. The shrink wrap keeps the food from spilling.
She then picks up two newspapers in the yard and places them by the door.
On Henderson Street, Hamilton follows their usual instructions and leaves the containers inside a metal door in the brick wall of the carport area.
On their way to the last stop, Gill points out the potholes in the road and says she was planning to talk to Mayor Kluttz about them during today’s route.
Ronnie Davis greets Hamilton at the front door at their last stop on North Main Street. He also gets a newspaper.
Davis says he looks forward to the Meals on Wheels because it gives him an opportunity to enjoy a meal that he doesn’t cook. “I cook most of my meals,” he says.
Back in the car, Gill looks at her watch and says it’s 11:26.
Hamilton says they usually finish earlier. “You are slowing us down,” she says, then adds, “You know we’re just teasing.”
After they return the coolers to the Downtowner, Gill says they’re headed to Wendy’s to eat lunch with four other volunteers from their church.
Arriving back in the parking lot, Gill announces, “Back to where we started.”
Lakey says she’s a good driver.
Gill responds, “You want to put that in writing. I’ll give it to the patrolman the next time he stops me.”
Gill and Hamilton are among 950 volunteers for Rowan County Meals on Wheels, according to Executive Director Rita Sims. That includes 65 individual volunteers as well as the 885 who volunteer as part of 59 churches and eight businesses which support the program.
“I know it sounds like a lot,” Sims says, “but we never have enough. It takes a minimum of 29 people every day just to get the meals out.”
There are an average of 194 people who receive Meals on Wheels Monday through Friday. It takes a total of 27 routes to reach them all, and Sims hasn’t been able to recruit enough volunteers to man a route needed on Old Beatty Ford Road.
This month is designated as March for Meals, when the Meals on Wheels Association of America holds special events and promotions to bring awareness to the program. In Rowan, a billboard on South Main Street features the slogan for the campaign, “March for Meals So No Senior Goes Hungry.”
Meals on Wheels has three meal sites in the county where volunteers pick up meals ó the Downtowner, CJ’s Restaurant in Cleveland and Jimmie’s in China Grove.
Sims says most routes take about an hour, and volunteers are given detailed instructions to recipients’ homes.
When people apply to receive the meals, Sims says a Meals on Wheels staffer will make a home visit to see if they qualify. Recipients need to be homebound and not able to cook for themselves.
People who are living with a family member who works during the day may also qualify.
Meals on Wheels offers a sliding fee scale determined by the recipients’ income with meals costing from $3.75 to $1. Some get them free.
Meals on Wheels is a Rowan County United Way agency. Sims says the program also receives funds from foundation grants and donations from individuals, churches and businesses.
Meals on Wheels also holds annual fundraisers. Sims says they raised $3,500 at last week’s barbecue fundraiser at First Presbyterian Church. College Barbecue cooked the food for the event.
Anyone interested in receiving Meals on Wheels or volunteering to deliver them can call 704-633-0352 for more information.