Gas prices pinch Meals on Wheels | The Wichita Eagle

Edward and Joan Norton have their Thursday routine firmly established. First, they start the day by going to breakfast. Then, they head to the Senior Services of Wichita building to pick up the meals they deliver for the local Meals on Wheels program. They've volunteered together for four years.

"It's just a day out for us," Joan Norton said.

When the retired couple walk into the center at about 10 a.m. each Thursday, the Nortons pick up the sheets that list their delivery addresses.

They take two routes each week — one that has nine stops around central Wichita and one farther west to drop 13 meals off at Country Acres Senior Residence. The drive takes about an hour.

Trying to recruit new volunteers to deliver meals becomes more difficult with higher gas prices, said Laurel Alkire, executive director of Senior Services Inc., the not-for-profit agency that operates Meals on Wheels.

"We say, 'Come drive for us all over town when gas is almost $4 a gallon,' " she said. "It makes it really tough."

The volunteers they have are less willing to pick up multiple routes on one day.

Without enough volunteers, Senior Services employees must deliver the meals. They receive staff mileage for their trips so it costs more for Meals on Wheels.

Locally, the program delivers about 900 prepared meals Monday through Friday to homebound people 60 or older who cannot cook for themselves. Meals on Wheels needs about 50 to 65 volunteers each weekday to deliver the meals, said Liz Buggs, volunteer coordinator for Meals on Wheels. Senior Services offers $2 to its volunteers to offset some of the drivers' gas costs. Even though some volunteers like the Nortons put the money back into a donation box each day, more drivers are keeping the money, Alkire said.

"It used to be that most of them wouldn't take that," she said. "However, more and more are starting to."

Nationally, gas prices are also affecting Meals on Wheels programs across the country, according to data from the Meals on Wheels Association of America.

The total daily cost of gas used by all U.S. Meals on Wheels programs exceeds $247,000, but a one-cent increase in the price of gas equals an additional $250,000 a year.

Alkire said that although the local program accounts for mileage and gas each year, the budgeting becomes a guessing game because it's done a year in advance.

Besides gas costs, the $1.3 million Wichita program could also face budget cuts, Alkire said. Federal, state and county funding make up the majority of the program's budget.

The Kansas budget for the fiscal year 2012, which takes effect July 1, shows $300,000 in cuts to senior nutrition. However, the Kansas Department on Aging reduced its spending so that the Meals on Wheels program will not see cuts, said Sara Arif, the department's director of public affairs.

The Department on Aging laid off 12 people and eliminated 22 positions to fund the cuts to nutrition and other senior programs, Arif said.

Alkire said she would not know of any reductions to the Meals on Wheels' budget from the federal government or Sedgwick County until those budgets are finalized later in 2011.

If cuts take place, Alkire said Meals on Wheels would have to increase its funding from donations and grants, which made up 12 percent of the 2011 budget.

However, she said she doesn't anticipate turning seniors away or putting them on a waiting list.

"We're all doing more with less," Alkire said. "We're doing what we have to do. The clients come first."

No matter gas prices or budget cuts, though, the Nortons plan to continue their routine until their health won't allow them to deliver meals. So they'll continue their roles — Edward as the driver, Joan as the deliverer — as they keep traveling their routes around Wichita.

On Thursday morning, as Edward parked the car, Joan grabbed a hot meal and a bag of cool items like milk and fruit from the back seat. She walked up to an apartment door, which the woman waiting for her answered.

"Good morning, how are you?" Joan said.

"All right," the woman replied.

"Have a good day," Joan said — something she makes sure to include at every drop-off.

She returned back to the car and buckled up, and Edward drove to the next address.

For some of the seniors, their Meals on Wheels delivery might be the only human interaction they get all day, which keeps Joan coming back, she said.

"We have our day that we're able to get out and do something and feel like you're helping somebody a little bit," she said.