Ellie Hol­lander The CEO of Meals on Wheels Amer­ica on why local pro­grams are clos­ing and what she’s going to do with a $70 mil­lion gift

Why do you think volun­teer­ism hasn’t bounced back since the pan­demic?

IS IT FAIR TO SAY THAT MEALS ON WHEELS IS THE LEAST CONTROVERSIAL CHARITY IN THE U.S.?

When we did our last pub­lic sur­vey of voters,

9 out of 10 knew of Meals on Wheels, and of those, 9 out of 10 thought favor­ably of it.

DOES THAT REPUTATION MAKE IT HARDER TO GET YOUR CONCERNS HEARD?

We’re a little hid­den in plain sight. We got a boost in atten­tion dur­ing the pan­demic, when all of us were hav­ing to isol­ate at home, won­der­ing where our next meal was com­ing from. This is the real­ity that the adults that Meals on Wheels serves deal with on a day-to-day basis.

HOW WORRIED ARE YOU ABOUT THE NUMBER OF LOCAL PROGRAMS THAT ARE CLOSING?

Some smal­ler pro­grams have had to fold. Some are mer­ging. We have a short­age of volun­teers. Since I’ve been work­ing here, I’ve been try­ing to get the char­it­able mileage reim­burse­ment rate raised from where it was set in 1997: 14¢. The busi­ness rate is 72.5¢. But there’s a lot of polar­iz­a­tion right now; it’s hard to get atten­tion for really any­thing on Cap­itol Hill.

MEALS ON WHEELS AMERICA IS CALLING FOR $2.285 BILLION IN FUNDING FOR THE OLDER AMERICANS ACT NUTRITION PROGRAM IN 2027, WHICH IS MORE THAN DOUBLE CURRENT LEVELS. WHY SO MUCH?

Because it’s never kept pace with need or the rising costs. Today, we’re serving about 2.6 mil­lion seni­ors. One in 3 pro­grams reports wait­ing lists of, on aver­age, four months. Some pro­grams have 4,000 people on a wait­ing list.

MACKENZIE SCOTT RECENTLY GAVE MEALS ON WHEELS AMERICA $70 MILLION. EVEN FOR HER, THAT’S A BIG GIFT. WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO USE IT FOR?

The goal of Meals on Wheels Amer­ica is to do what our indi­vidual pro­grams can’t do. What they do best is help vul­ner­able seni­ors. What we do is advoc­ate for them, raise pub­lic aware­ness and vis­ib­il­ity, and do research to help make the case with donors in their com­munit­ies. That’s the thing about get­ting a gift like that. You could spend it down in an hour get­ting people off wait­ing lists, but are you going to solve the big­ger prob­lem? We’re try­ing to do both.

WE HAVE SOCIAL SECURITY AND MEDICARE, AND AMERICA HAS NO FOOD SHORTAGE. WHY ARE SENIORS HUNGRY?

There are 14 mil­lion seni­ors who are threatened by hun­ger, and that’s grown by about 3.1 mil­lion in just three years. They have lim­ited mobil­ity. They’re deal­ing with mul­tiple chronic con­di­tions. They’re not able to get to a food bank. They’re not able to pre­pare their own food.

WHERE ARE THEIR FAMILIES?

Their fam­ily may live nowhere near them. We’re often the first point of con­tact when something goes wrong. We’re the people that reach out to a fam­ily mem­ber to let them know that there’s a prob­lem.

IS ONE OF THE CHALLENGES THAT IT’S HARD TO MAKE THIS FEEL URGENT?

I think unless you have an older adult in your life, you think Meals on Wheels is always going to be there.

TO BE CLEAR, MEALS ON WHEELS is ALWAYS GOING TO BE THERE, RIGHT?

Well, Meals on Wheels is a net­work of indi­vidual com­munity pro­grams. Is there always going to be a Meals on Wheels pro­gram in your com­munity? I can’t guar­an­tee that. But will there always be Meals on Wheels some­where? Yes, I abso­lutely believe it.