A northern Illinois food assistance program has been drawing heavily on community donations due to the state’s budget impasse.
Colleen Bredeson is the community outreach coordinator for the Voluntary Action Center in Sycamore, which administers the area Meals on Wheels program.
Around 275 meals are delivered by volunteers each day to the homebound in DeKalb County. Organizers rely on state and federal funding. Organizers say the state portion is only now slowly trickling back in.
Last fall, a private dollar-for-dollar match funded service through June 30th.
“If we don’t pass a state budget and receive definite funding, we are going to fall back into the same predicament we were in before," Bredeson said. "It’s going to just be a matter of trying to encourage people to tell the legislators that they need to make sure that they get that budget passed by June 30th so that we can have some definite funding so we know how to plan our budget.”
Bredeson says, in addition to providing food, the volunteers are sometimes the only ones to check-in on those they serve who may be battling several health problems.
“They don’t have family in the area, or some don’t have family at all. Most seniors live on a fixed income, and some of them don’t have savings or much income. So, it is very difficult, even if they could get out to afford to pay for the groceries.”
If funded, DeKalb County’s Meals on Wheels program hopes to cut down on its growing wait list.
