Wasilla Senior Center dialing in donors with phone-a-thon fund-raiser

WASILLA – For disabled Wasilla resident Ellen Setters, her daily visit from a “Meals on Wheels” delivery driver is the highlight of her day.

“I just lost both of my parents and if I didn’t see Shelly, I wouldn’t see anyone,” Setters, 62, said Thursday of Wasilla Senior Center driver Shelly Johnson. “And I wouldn’t have a hot meal. I would just eat tuna fish and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. So I can’t say enough about this program.”

Setters is one of about 90 Mat-Su Valley seniors who receive daily meals at their homes through the Wasilla Senior Center’s food services program.

A total of about 3,500 meals are served each month to local seniors either at the Wasilla Senior Center, at 1301 Century Circle, or through the Meals on Wheels program.

But the program isn’t cheap and needs donations from community members to stay afloat, Wasilla Senior Center Marketing Manager Diana Straub said Monday.

So for the second year now, the senior center has launched a community wide “Feed-A-Senior-For-A-Day Phone-A-Thon” to raise at least $50,000 to cover 5,882 meals.

The original idea was for the 129 residents of the Senior Center’s housing complex to call three people they know to ask them to donate at least $8.50 to help feed a senior for a day – or $47.50 for five days or even more to cover an entire month of meals.

Last year, $26,000 was raised in one weekend, so Straub and Executive Director Sondra Kaplan are confident this year’s fund-raising period of 10 days, from Dec. 6 to Dec 15, will bring in at least twice that amount.

Plus, this year the program is adding a new feature to encourage large groups and other community members to get involved in the effort.

“We’d like to see local businesses and organizations challenge each other to see who can raise the most,” Straub said. “And some businesses are willing to match donations from employees, so that’s another way to raise funds quickly.”

One of those organizations is the Service to Mankind group, or Sertoma. When Kaplan asked members of Sertoma to come to her office recently and get on their cell phones to see how much they could raise, they rang up $5,000 in pledges in only one hour.

“One of the great things that happened when I started calling people was that in the course of our conversations we discussed having monthly pledges so there could be ongoing support throughout the year, so I’ve added that to my script this year,” said Paula Nance, who not only works for Sertoma but serves as regional vice president of AK USA Federal Credit Union. “My dad is 86 and just had a triple heart bypass, but he’s still very active and didn’t hesitate saying yes to donating when I called him.”

Nance said her employer contributes to seniors every year through their “Miles for Meals” 2K run and the Polar Plunge into Finger Lake from the Palmer Elks Lodge.

“I’ve been familiar with Wasilla area seniors and their facility and I know under Sondra Kaplan’s leadership they’ve been able to bring the organization back into the black,” Nance said. “It’s just fabulous what they’ve done with the facility over there.”

Carl Tinsley, who serves on the Senior Center Board of Directors and lives in the senior complex, said he does what he can to help raise funds for the meals program.

“I already got $100 from one person when I was visiting my brothers in the Lower 48,” Tinsley said Monday, adding with a chuckle, “I’ll be getting out and going around to businesses in the next few days to see who I can con . . . I mean, convince to help us out. We do have a good program here and good meals.”

Ellen Setters couldn’t agree more. Wheelchair-bound in her small apartment off Wasilla-Fishhook Road, Setters often compliments the chef responsible for her daily meals.

“Do you think he’s getting sick of hearing from me?” she asked Johnson, who brought her a homemade lunch of sesame chicken, fried rice and vegetables. “I always love what he cooks.”

Johnson, who also takes care of her own disabled father who lives downstairs from her in her duplex, said she gets a lot of joy from being around the seniors.

“It makes a difference when someone appreciates what you do,” she said as she headed off to deliver more meals.

For more information on the Feed-A-Senior-For-A-Day program, call the Wasilla Senior Center at 376-3104 or go to www.alaskaseniors.com.

Contact K.T. McKee at kate.mckee@frontiersman.com or call 352-2252.