After nearly a year of planning and organizing, Meals on Wheels Yolo County held a grand opening and ribbon-cutting ceremony for its Winters Senior Nutrition Center Thursday, welcoming hundreds of local leaders and stakeholders to tour the facility.
The official name of the nutritional center was unveiled during the event as “Meals on Wheels Sutter Health Senior Nutrition Center,” which is largely due to Sutter Health’s planned investment of $100,000 to help operationalize the new meal production kitchen inside the nutrition center.
“The launch of this senior nutrition center goes beyond mere meals,” Kelly Brenk, Sutter Health’s community health director, argued during the event. “The space helps keep local foods fresher for longer and brings to life recipes tailored to meet the diverse dietary needs of Yolo County’s most vulnerable neighbors. Good nutrition can help lead to more sustained, positive health outcomes over time.”
The 5,300-square-foot facility provides the nonprofit organization with active cooking space, extensive cool storage and a supply warehouse that will double its meal production capacity from 800 to 1,700 meals daily in combination with its existing Woodland-based kitchen.
“This Senior Nutrition Center is a game changer for senior health in Yolo County both physically and mentally minimizing medical intervention and allowing seniors to age in place longer in their own homes,” Joy Cohan, executive director of the Meals on Wheels Yolo County, said during the ceremony. “With this transformational facility, we can double down on our already 110% growth in service to aging adults in our community over the past two years starting with an initial strategic goal to nourish at least 1,000 seniors every weekday by the end of this calendar year.”
Cohan remarked that her organization is striving to provide for at least one-third of the total need in the county by 2026 noting that the 2020 Census found that more than 8,000 seniors were living in poverty in Yolo County.
The opening of the Winters facility – located at 111 Main St. – came only months after the nonprofit organization held a ribbon-cutting ceremony in late July for its new downtown Woodland administrative office located at 711 Main St., Suite B, which was an attempt to increase visibility and create more awareness for the organization.
Cohan noted that although the path to opening the kitchen was difficult, she was lucky to have found the 111 Main St. location in Winters after speaking to Sandy Vickrey, who is now a member of the Meals on Wheels Board of Directors.
“Knowing that capacity expansion was critical to having the kind of impact we needed to have county-wide, I’ve been on the hunt for close to a year for the right institutional commercial kitchen setting,” Cohan said.
Vickrey told Cohan about Buckhorn’s old catering operation that had been mostly inactive since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“As we had more seniors to nourish than ever as a result of the pandemic, it truly was destiny,” Cohan highlighted. “Our new friends at Buckhorn even kindly left valuable cool storage units in the facility for us. It’s proof that great things happen in Winters and the stage is now set for that to continue.”
Yolo County Board Supervisor Lucas Frerichs, District 2, represents Davis and Winters and said he had been a deliverer for Meals on Wheels for many years prior to the pandemic. He argued that while it serves as an invaluable food resource for the county’s seniors, it also serves as an “impromptu social service” for them.
“There is an epidemic of loneliness in this country that is happening and Meals on Wheels just serves as such a vital link to have people be able to come on a regular basis… just to be able to sort of see how people are doing,” he highlighted. “I encourage you to get engaged in this fantastic nonprofit.”
Furthermore, Assembly Speaker Pro Tempore Cecilia Aguiar-Curry left a recorded message that was shown during the ceremony that detailed how she was able to secure nearly half $1 million in state funding for Meals on Wheels.
“Meals on Wheels Yolo County has been shouldering the heavy lifting of providing senior food security from an inadequate facility for way too long,” Aguiar-Curry said in the recording. “When I saw firsthand in the summer of 2022 the extraordinary work this team is doing in an undersized 40-year-old kitchen, I understood then if they had more space to prepare more meals, they can serve double and possibly even triple the number of seniors.”
Aguiar-Curry then secured $487,848 of “transformational funding” for Meals on Wheels to secure the expansion.
“California has the largest population of older adults in the entire nation, and with the cost of living, the need for Meals on Wheels has only increased,” she emphasized. “I recently had a birthday, turned 69, and as an older adult myself I’m fully aware of the unique needs of an aging population and I plan to continue to support senior rights and their care.”
Woodland Mayor Pro Tempore Tania Garcia-Cadena attended the event to represent Woodland and the Woodland Food Closet. She serves as the food closet’s executive director and said the new kitchen is important because it will help reach more of the county’s food-insecure seniors.
“The food closet does serve all of Yolo County as well but there are many people who can’t come to the food closet or maybe they’re not able to prepare their meals,” Garcia-Cadena stressed. “So having Meals on Wheels expand their operation is really important.”
Following the ribbon cutting, guests were able to tour the facility while Meals on Wheels staff provided samples of the food it prepares for seniors throughout the week. Additionally, attendees were able to leave a handprint on the cabinets for $50 to commemorate the grand opening.
Sponsors for the project included Buckhorn Kitchen, Sutter Health, Cal Foods Logistics, The Davis CPA, Rotary Club of Davis and more.
To learn more about Meals on Wheels Yolo County, visit mowyolo.org.