Home-Delivered Meals

During this fiscal year, we expect to deliver over 1 million meals. While this amount might seem staggering, it accurately represents the need we see in Tarrant County. The cost of each meal our kitchen staff prepares daily and our dedicated volunteers deliver is $5. This is such a reasonable expense to make sure that someone does not have to make the choice between food or medication, eating or not eating.

Without our service, many of our clients would live in a nursing home or have other institutional-type care. It might surprise you to learn that we can deliver meals to one homebound person for an entire year at a cost lower than one day in a hospital or nursing home. Our home-delivered meals program also saves money for taxpayers, who often subsidize the cost of nursing home care.

Each client is evaluated by a professional case manager before going on the program. Clients are revisited at least every 90 days to determine if they are still eligible and if they need additional assistance. Clients are visited in their home so that case managers can assess their environment and ability to maintain independent living. The case managers ask questions related to activities of daily living, nutrition, physical and mental well-being, and resources available (financial and family) to help in times of immediate need.

The majority of our clients were self-sufficient and productive their entire life; they now can no longer remain at home without help. We have two special clients named Gladys and Pablo. They have been married for more than 30 years, and when Gladys became wheelchair-bound, Pablo took over the cooking and cleaning. Then, when he had a heart attack, he could no longer stand long enough to cook and clean. The couple wanted to stay together in their home but knew they could not do it alone. They called Meals On Wheels and now are able to live at home through assistance from our meal delivery and client services programs. Our mission is to keep people like Gladys and Pablo living where they want to be, with independence and dignity, for as long as possible.