ROANOKE, Va. – The Local Office on Aging is inviting you to lunch, virtually. It’s part of its Let’s Give Lunch fundraiser for its Meals on Wheels program.
The event is known as Let’s Have Lunch, but going virtual and a tweak in the name isn’t the only change you’ll see.
Your donation doesn’t get you a lunch of your own like before, but it still will make a difference. When you donate $15 that covers three meals, but no donation is too small.
Another change, instead of being one day the fundraiser goes from Monday, June 22 to Friday, June 26 where the community joins via Facebook live.
From there, you can see entertainers, meet volunteers, staff and the seniors who benefit from Meals on Wheels.
A virtual event isn’t ideal, but the Local Office on Aging President and CEO, Ron Boyd said they didn’t want to move the fundraiser to the fall and compete with other spring events who did the same.
“It is really our only overt, tangible fundraiser that we have each year and of course we depend on it if we actually made $100,000 it would actually cover the Roanoke Valley Meals on Wheels the actual cost of the meal for two months.”
Keep in mind, the Roanoke Valley isn’t all the LOA covers. It helps seniors in Botetourt County, Craig County and the Alleghany Highlands
The deadline to purchase raffle tickets is June 18th. To purchase your tickets, click here. There will be a drawing on Facebook Live each day.
Last year Let’s Have Lunch raised over $97,000. This year, the goal is to top that and get $100,000.
Boyd tells us he is hoping going virtual doesn’t hinder them reaching that goal, because they need it especially now.
On average, Meals on Wheels helps more than 800 seniors from the Roanoke Valley to the Allegany Highlands which is more than 120,000 meals. Since the pandemic has more seniors staying home and in need, now those numbers are much higher.
“We have opened up and we are adding more people into Meals on Wheels. Of course, we’ve added our congregate diners club. We had to close those up early on in the pandemic. Bottom line is we are serving more people than we ever served before.”
To donate and learn more about Lets Give Lunch, click here.