A nonprofit providing meals to older Arlington County residents is on track to receive county funding for the first time.
The county plans to provide $105,000 in direct support to the Arlington Meals on Wheels program in the coming fiscal year. This is the first time that the nonprofit has asked for local funding in response to a growing community need.
“The fact that we’ve received it really speaks a lot to the interest [from the County Board] in ensuring food security for everyone, especially our older adults,” Helen King, director of the Arlington Area Agency on Aging, said at an Arlington Commission on Aging meeting last week. “This is really huge.”
Last December, King had sounded the alarm at a Commission on Aging meeting, saying federal and state funding alone would not be enough. Fundraising efforts have helped to fill the gap, she said, but local government funding would provide a financial cushion.
Founded in 1971, the Arlington program relies on nearly 140 volunteers who, in 2024, delivered more than 93,000 meals to nearly 300 clients over age 60.
“These are Arlington residents who are homebound and unable to provide food for themselves who would otherwise fall through the cracks of Arlington’s excellent programs,” Meals on Wheels says on the Arlington Community Foundation website.
“An added benefit to our program is that because Meals on Wheels drivers have regular contact with our clients, they can be our eyes on the ground,” the organization says. “In the event they see something that would affect a client’s health or safety, Meals on Wheels will communicate these concerns to Arlington County, for follow-up by a social worker.”
Pandemic-era funding streams helped the organization bring in about $224,000 in revenue and increase its net assets to about $300,000 in fiscal 2023, the latest for which tax-filing figures are publicly available.
The preceding two fiscal years saw expenses exceed revenues due to a decline in fundraising. The organization sold some of its assets to cover the gaps.
Arlington’s Meals on Wheels program contracts with a commercial kitchen to prepare five lunches and five dinners per week for clients. They are delivered, along with beverages, by drivers — typically once a week on Wednesdays.
The current cost is $61 per client per week. Those with the means to pay are asked to reimburse the organization the full cost, while those of lesser means pay less or nothing at all.
Arlington’s Meals on Wheels program is one of about 5,000 community-based affiliates under the umbrella of Crystal City-based Meals on Wheels America. However, it does not receive funding from the national organization.
Photo via Ryan Reinoso/Unsplash
