In Berkeley Springs, West Virginia, there is one organization that serves hot meals to those in need.
It’s called the Morgan County Starting Points Family Resource Center.
This past Friday, the group and its community volunteers served over 178 hot meals to those in need.
The hot meal program is called the Meal Time Community Kitchen.
And it’s open Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 3:30 to 5:30 pm. (187 South Green Street, Berkeley Springs, West Virginia).
No questions asked.
Starting Points director Audrey Morris says that most people pick up their meals and take them home — although a few come in and eat their meals at Starting Points.
“In 2014, we served over 21,000 hot meals,” Morris told This Week in Morgan County with Russell Mokhiber.
Starting Points also has a backpack program that delivers a bag of food every Friday to 350 students.
“We try and put the food bags put into the child’s backpack while they are out on the playground or at lunch or someplace else,” Morris said. “It should work that the students receiving it are not identified by their peers.”
How serious is the poverty in Morgan County?
“We do know that the poverty rate in schools is over 60 percent,” Morris said.
Most of the food is donated or purchased with money donated from the community.
“We get donations every Sunday from farmers market vendors,” Morris said. “Food Lion has been amazing in the last year and a half. On weekends, we receive food from the bakery. During the week, the bakery items go to the Senior Center but on weekends, we get them.. We’re getting fresh produce also.”
Starting Points also has a literacy program.
“Through our literacy program, we are sending brand new books home with pre-school kids,” Morris said. “With those free books, we are also sending information to parents — information on how important it is to read to kids.”
Morris said that she doesn’t consider her work charity. It’s more helping families help themselves, she says.
While families might come in during times of crisis, in a few cases, Starting Points has been successful in breaking the cycle of poverty — by helping people get jobs — including one woman who worked with Starting Points to land a $14 an hour job.
But Morris says that Morgan County is the third most expensive county in the state when it comes to housing costs.
“If you living in Morgan County, you would need $15.75 to be able to afford a two bedroom rental,” Morris said. “And the theory is not more than 30 percent of your income should be going to housing expenses — not just the rent, but all of the costs of living there — electric and all of your services — should not be more than 30 percent. And a lot of people are paying over 50 percent of their income to live somewhere — and that’s not a mansion, it’s just someplace that’s safe — then where are you getting food, how can you afford to have a car? In Morgan County, we have no public transportation. And we see people walking all over the place. And we are the only county in the eight county region that does not have public transportation.”