Dear Friends and Partners,
This is the November 8th update of
Wright County’s Care and Nutrition Partnership Support for Seniors (60+).
We are starting our 34th week of response to COVID-19. Wright County
Community Action (WCCA) has a support line for seniors; please encourage
seniors to call (320) 963-6500 ext. 274. As a community, we want to help with our
most vulnerable neighbors’ challenges, including isolation and the impact that
results, assistance with grocery access through education, grocery delivery,
senior mobile food shelf needs, frozen meal support, prescription access, and
needs like housekeeping, chores, assisted transportation and other logistical
issues as they present.
NourishingHOPE is extending frozen meal support just
beyond the Wright County Line to the east into Western Hennepin County. Seniors
there in Western Hennepin County can reach out to NourishingHOPE to
learn about frozen meal support in their local community. These
communities in Western Hennepin are included: Corcoran, Greenfield, Hamel,
Hassen, Loretto, Rogers, Delano, Hanover, Maple Plain, Otsego, and
Rockford. For
more information about Western Hennepin services, please contact nourishinghope.oflc@gmail.com or call (763) 477-6300.
Wright
County COVID-19 IMPACT
As of November
5th we have 3,357 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Wright County. This
measurement began March 13th of this year. This week we had
another substantial surge of 626 new confirmed cases which
is considerably up, increasing by 229 new cases L more than last week’s
increase of 397 and the increase of 191 new cases the week before. 626 is a new
record high greatly surpassing again last week’s record high of 397. This is a trend we need to proactively slow down. LL
November
has started out with a bang. This week’s surge is significant and our
seniors particularly should take notice. This week on November 5th we
experienced another single day record of 116. The previous
single day high was 75 cases on October 29th.
November 5,
2020
There is
a total of 48 new cases this week in
our population of over 70 years of age more than
doubling last week’s gain of 22 for a pandemic total of 251. This is
over a 20% increase in just the
last week. L
https://www.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/52d559cfbe6e4ca39558c9b2f877e144
Currently
the oldest COVID-19 case in Wright County is 101 years of age
and the youngest case is three months.
With
cases surging, it is even more important to consider the impact on our oldest
residents. Separation and social distancing are important in the protection of this vulnerable
group. Please recognize the fact that isolation also has a negative
impact on mental health. No matter how old you are, just ask yourself: are you feeling a little less at ease since this pandemic
began? Please share this story
so all our seniors know a place to go if they want to confidentially check into
resources they may need – also please call the seniors in your life and
your senior neighbors to let them know you care.
Frozen
meal packing event highlight
This week’s packers including four
volunteers packed 2,100 senior
frozen meals. We are really
grateful for these four ladies.
If you
have a team that might want to help us pack meals on a Wednesday or Thursday
morning please let us know.
Packing happens about every week and takes less than two hours. It can be
a lot fun. Next week we have a Small Group from Northridge Fellowship
Church packing on Wednesday. Each packing can be done with up to 4 or 5
volunteers. Call 763-658-4414 if you want to learn more about this volunteering
opportunity.
Shout-out
to Strategic Partners
Our Aging Alliance
calling team at WCCA made 2,398 Health and Reassurance calls
in the month of October. Currently, the Care and Nutrition Partnership
has 745 seniors receiving Frozen
Meals. In the month of October we served just over 350 meals per day for a total of 7,718 meals.
Local
freezers like the one at the Annandale Food Shelf have made a tremendous
impact in this Partnership’s capacity to support our seniors.
Trailblazer
and local volunteers delivered over 2,100 frozen just this last week
Special
delivery – Untiedt’s last Fall pick of Tomatoes
🍅 🍅 🍅 Farmer Jerry 🍅 🍅 🍅 really came through with the
tomatoes. We delivered 389
cases of tomatoes and potatoes with additional surprise of an undisclosed
bonus of brussels sprouts. Joel delivered: Yellow Slicing Tomatoes,
Red Grape Tomatoes, Yellow Grape Tomatoes, Roma Tomatoes, and Red Slicing
Tomatoes. To balance the load, 50 cases of potatoes were also delivered.
Removing
brussels sprouts from the stem
Big Lake Food Shelf
Love
INC Heartland
Grace Place sharing tomatoes
Joel says the conveyor system is a great time saver and
support for volunteers
NorishingHOPE through their network distributed 179
cases of tomatoes this last week
Please let us know if
there are any food security partners that we are not reaching with fresh fruit
and vegetables from Untiedt’s Vegetable Farm. Please
forward this email to them or give them our contact information.
If you or
a potential partner would like to help expand this resource to our seniors
expressly on Highway 12, please consider donating to the “COVID-19 Food” fund at the Delano Loretto
Area United Way:
Write a
check to: Delano Loretto Area United Way
In the
memo line, write: “COVID-19 Food.”
Mail
to:
P.O. Box 578
Delano, MN 55328
Or visit
the Delano Loretto Area United Way Website http://www.delanolorettouw.org/ and click “Donate” -- donations
via credit card or PayPal (click on “write a note”, write “COVID-19 Food”)
If you
want to target expansion of frozen meal delivery in other parts of Wright
County including the Highway 55 corridor and I-94 corridor, please consider
donating to the “COVID-19 Food” fund at Wright County Community Action:
Write a
check to: Wright County Community Action
In the
memo line, write: “COVID-19 Food.”
Mail
to:
P.O. Box 787
Maple Lake, MN 55358
Or visit
the Wright County Community Action Agency Website (dedicate to: “COVID-19 Food”) https://www.wccaweb.com
The
entire community of Wright County is in this together! (see current partner
list below)
Please forward this email to potential
partners!
Thrilled,
Jay
Weatherford
WCCA
Executive Director
For more
information for Wright County senior support services:
https://www.wccaweb.com/Home/Index (click current
programs)
or
email: agingservices@wccaweb.com
or call:
(320)
963-6500 Ext 274 – Aging Program Manager - Eric Nagel
(320)
963-6500 Ext 241 – Dispatch
1-800-333-2433 – Senior LinkAge Line
Delivered
Frozen Meal Program(s) – WCCA at (320) 963-6500 Ext 274 or Catholic Charities
Meals on Wheels program located in Maple Lake: (320) 963-5771, Annandale: (320) 274-3891 and Buffalo: (763) 682-6036
To
volunteer:
Contact (320) 963-6500 Ext. 225 –– Jen Liebeck jliebeck@wccaweb.com
Or enroll on Website: https://www.wccaweb.com/Home/Volunteer
New
Partner and First Time Reader Overview
Farmers: food shelfs and senior programs can use
your support. Please share this email with your Wright County
farmer friends potentially able to contribute, or other Food Security Partners
that could use this produce to support their efforts. For large
donations, WCCA will use its resources to make distributions happen.
Again, going forward we hope to expand this list of local food security
recipients that could use fresh vegetables when they become available. If you
are serving local individuals at no cost and would like to be included in this
potential fresh vegetable distribution opportunity, please email me a cell
phone number to text. When an opportunity arises, a rapid response will
be needed. Based on a first come first serve distribution and
availability, Wright County Community Action will do our best to share these
resources as they come in and deliver them to partner locations.
Partner support
·
Second Harvest – free
and reduced cost bulk raw food products for frozen meal production.
·
Delano Coburn’s – weekly
food rescue makes a tremendous impact on food security resources.
·
Local Farmers –
Untiedt’s Vegetable Farm and Dechene Corporation of Big Lake Minnesota –
contributing produce for senior meal support and local food security needs.
·
Waverly Café - ingenuity
and giving spirit including their PPP loan directed at paying their staff to
produce senior meals, catering expertise, and use of their commercial kitchen.
·
Catholic Charities
partially funded by Central MN Council on Aging – frozen meals contribution and
Meals-on-Wheels referral partner.
·
Cargill – breakfast
meals.
·
J&B Group – bulk
warehouse freezer storage including bulk prepared meal storage and bulk raw
food storage; not to mention helping us resolve logistical issues, as well as
supplying a really great box with the outcome of providing so many solutions to
challenges we have faced in our production process.
·
Buffalo Crossings LLC,
owner of Oriental Buffet in Buffalo – commercial walk-in freezer, commercial
walk-in cooler, and commercial kitchen to pack and store senior meals.
·
Local Food Shelves -
local frozen meal and bulk food storage, as well as senior services
registration (Annandale Food Shelf, Buffalo Food Shelf, Monticello Help Center,
and Waverly Food Shelf).
·
Trailblazer – daily
volunteer based County-wide local meal delivery.
·
Delano Senior Center –
senior services application fulfillment and frozen meal distribution, as well
as Meals-on-Wheels referral partner.
·
NourshingHOPE – senior
services applications fulfillment, frozen meal distribution, and produce
distributions.
·
Wright County Human
Services/Public Health – volunteer recruitment support, data support,
instructional materials design, and logistics support.
·
St. Cloud Refrigeration
– emergency air conditioning for the Waverly Café kitchen.
·
Electrical Workers
Union, IBEW Local 292 – brought to the partnership Olympia Tech Electric to
support new electrical service needed at Waverly Café
·
Olympia Tech Electric –
installing new electrical services at Waverly Café needed for additional
freezer capacity
·
Local Lions Clubs –
local community freezer development and contributions to the cost of frozen
meals (Waverly, Montrose, Howard Lake, Maple Lake, Loretto, and Monticello).
·
Local Municipalities –
local freezer storage funding support (City of Waverly, City of Montrose, City
of Howard Lake).
·
Health Care Partners –
Allina Health (financial support)
·
Other Local Corporations
– Citizen State Bank of Waverly (freezer funding support), HWY 55 Trailer Sales
of Buffalo, and Walgreens (shopping bags).
·
Local Faith-based
organizations – many very giving churches for many years have been active in
financial support for food security across Wright County (too many to mention
them all – but you know who you are) . – in addition, Love INC, St Mary’s
Catholic Church, Alleluia Lutheran, Our Father’s Lutheran, St. John’s Lutheran,
North Ridge Fellowship Small Group and friends, Montrose United Methodist Church
have provide support for senior call center activity, B.R.E.A.D program
outreach, volunteer administrative services, food security, food preparation,
and meal and food storage - access and delivery.
·
Initiative Foundations,
Delano Loretto Area United Way, Wright County Area United Way, Mardag
Foundation, and St Paul and Minnesota Foundations including funding for
COVID-19 direct response, Catchafire membership, and B.R.E.A.D. program
funding.
·
State Live Well at Home
Funding and Federal Title III funding support administered by the Minnesota
Board on Aging and Central Minnesota Council on Aging.
·
Wholesale purchase of
recyclable meal trays.
·
Oliver Equipment Lease
for the required equipment to seal the senior meal trays.
·
AMI Group and IDA Foods
– access to airline meal vendors adding senior meal production capacity and
contingency support. This opportunity to purchase over stock of
first-class airline meals due to drop in air travel and our partners sharing
their relationships.
·
Tireless WCCA Staff
support from multiple programs working to braid any allowable resource to make
a difference for our seniors.
·
Countless community
volunteers - everything from administrative services support, logistics and
storage coordination, bulk food and materials transport, senior transportation,
local meal delivery, meal packing, senior call center activity, PPE production
and product support, volunteer coordination, food rescue, and so many more
details where you fill the gap (you too, know who you are – we are so
grateful for your courage and willingness to step forward to meet needs).
Call to Action
There is still much more opportunity for local
corporate and civic partners to get involved. It’s simple solutions like
packing meals in the Walgreens shopping bags or storing bulk meals or protein
on the warehouse freezer floor at J&B Group that have made all the difference.
Given the chance there are many incredible businesses that have unique
resources, relationships, buying power, and experience. We really
hope to find more corporate partners willing to leverage their earned knowledge
and distinctive talents to improve this support for our seniors during the
pandemic. Leveraging what they do best including their marketing,
buying power, and connections brings together powerful partners. When we
put our heads together, we dig up unique ways like those mentioned briefly
above. These often come from you readers. So please share this email with your
friend, neighbor, or corporate partner so that this story can be told, and those big
thinkers out there have the opportunity to step forward and do what they do
best.
Its leaders like Waverly Café, J&B Group,
Cargill, St. Cloud Refrigeration, Buffalo Crossing, and Untiedt Vegetable Farm
that are showing us ways for other corporate partners to leverage their buying
power, innovation, and economy of scale that will most likely take this
delivery system to the next level. We need you thinkers to help refine
our process as a community, interested in protecting our most vulnerable
population by leveraging their lessons learned; those lessons that have brought
your businesses to the success they are today. Share this message with your friends: during the same years that many of your
companies were established and being built to thrive, the people we are
trying to protect were your customers. This might be a great
opportunity to now give back to the ones who supported you and help them
thrive.
We need to refine solutions in local communities
for freezer storage, access to bulk buying, shared and efficient transportation
opportunities, HR teams organizing volunteers to support local distribution in
their community, corporate giving through community investment and
matching. We need volunteered ingenuity from our bankers and other
corporate partners that can bring their experience to this effort to
shore up and produce a stronger, even more sustainable model than we have
today. It is partners with their buying power, innovation, and economy of
scale that are now needed to continue to refine our process. There is
still local ingenuity to leverage in this crisis seeking local solutions that
will only enhance, extend, and sustain the investment of the federal and state
agencies.
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