The Niverville Seniors Lunch program is currently on hiatus for the summer, but there’s a good chance it won’t be coming back in the fall unless volunteers step up.
The lunch program is held every Tuesday throughout the fall, winter, and spring at the Friendship Centre on Second Avenue South. For the low cost of only $8, each attendee gets a full hot meal plus dessert, entertainment, and of course conversation with friends. There are routinely more than 80 people at the lunch.
Betty Harder has been coordinator of the lunch for about two years, and she explains that they are facing a big problem: the volunteer cooks have both retired.
The coordinator, two cooks, and about 20 helpers are all volunteers. These positions are almost all held by senior citizens. Without new cooks, the program cannot continue.
Over the past year, the two former cooks took turns running the lunch. They did the menu planning and shopping, and of course they prepared the food.
Harder understands that the work required is a fairly tall order to ask of any volunteer. She says she is open to almost any idea that would allow for the lunches to continue.
When asked what options she would consider, Harder describes a few potential scenarios: four cooks who each take one week per month, a separation of the shopping and preparation jobs, or even finding volunteers from local school cooking classes.
Harder has also considered raising the price of the meal high enough to allow them to hire a cook, but she acknowledges that this could create a new problem. As a general rule, most seniors are on a fixed income. Raising the cost of the meal could potentially leave some people unable to attend.
Harder has also thought about seeking corporate sponsorship to help cover the costs associated with the meal. Basically, they have three main fees: the food, the facility rental, and potentially the cook’s salary.
“Our mission is to give seniors a place to get a good hot meal and to have fellowship with other seniors,” says Harder. “So we’re willing to consider many different things to keep this going.”
The only qualifications needed for the position of cook are a willingness to learn how to prepare food for a large group of people and a love of seniors and fellow volunteers.
The two cooks who just retired are willing to come back in the fall to show new cooks the ropes and help them get started.
As far as the facility rental fee goes, the seniors lunch program already gets a discount to use the Friendship Centre. Fran Giesbrecht, secretary treasurer of the Friendship Centre’s board, explains that the usual fee is $150 for four hours, but the seniors lunch program gets a reduced rate of $125.
The lunch group also has permission to use the facility for longer than four hours, and they are able to keep a deep freeze, fridge, and storage area in the building.
The Friendship Centre is 100 percent funded by rentals. Keeping up with the increased cost of hydro and maintaining the facility is challenging enough for the board, but they also have been working to improve and beautify the property.
“When we took the panelling off the walls and painted the walls white and changed the lighting so it was brighter and cheerier in there, you wouldn’t even believe all the compliments we got [from the seniors],” says Giesbrecht. “And the first year we decorated for Christmas as a board, one of the ladies came to me and she was crying. She said, ‘I’ve never felt more special in my life.’”
The seniors lunch program attracts people from all around southeast Manitoba. Harder says there are regular attendees from Steinbach, Lorette, St. Pierre, La Broquerie, and many other towns.
The program was formed approximately 40 years ago by a group of local women who wanted to better the lives of the senior in and around Niverville.
Eventually the lunch was taken over by Abe Goertzen, who was the first Service to Seniors coordinator in Niverville. In 2016, the lunch became a separate entity from the Service to Seniors mandate and was taken over by Fred and Susan Bergmann. Three years later, the Bergmanns retired from the position.
The lunch has been in a few different hands since then. Someone has always stepped up to take over the reins of this meaningful program.
If you are interested in volunteering, sponsoring, or donating to the seniors lunch program, please contact Betty Harder (bettyharder2@icloud.com, 204-392-8474).
