Due to COVID-19 Our Daily Bread has reassessed multiple times to protect the safety of our guests, volunteers and staff.
Most significantly, our number of volunteers have dropped (see the Volunteer Hours Comparison chart), and our dining room is closed to the public (guests pick up hot meals, daily snack bags, weekend meal bags and coffee/water at the front door).
Kitchen volunteers arrive between 7:30AM and 8AM and start boxing lunches at 8:10AM, as we regularly serve 100+ meals in the first half hour. Volunteers dish up and bag to-go meals, providing more food then we used to put on the plate so that guests do not need to come through line more than once. We also serve 3-4 times more food per meal than we did prior to COVID-19, in recognition that we are now the sole source of food for many guests due to reductions in other food-service programs.
Our meal numbers are also much higher now – usually between 400-500 per day. (see the Meals Served During Covid chart). In addition to daily meals Monday-Friday, We are also serving between 250 and 300 weekend meal bags each Fridays.
As for safety, we are doing everything we can to mitigate potential exposure. All staff and volunteers are required to enter the building through our back door, wear masks and practice 6-foot social distancing. Potential volunteers must weigh their risk factors and make the personal decision if they feel comfortable volunteering.
Things look and feel very different, but our heart is the same: we feed people, and we do it with dignity.
For more information on volunteering on-site, email kathy@ourdailybread.us
For more information about providing support off-site visit: https://www.ourdailybread.us/covid19faqsforonsitevolunteers/