Leelanau Essentials—the workers who keep us safe during the pandemic. Meet Suttons Bay’s Food Relief volunteers
From staff reports
Jim and Ann Muennich launched Food Relief last month together with members of Suttons Bay Congregational church. Local restaurants are paid menu-prices for repacked lunches, which are then distributed to individuals and families. The goal is both to help people in need and to provide a revenue stream for local restaurants. Initial meals were purchased from Suttons Bay restaurants V.I. Grill, Streetside Grille, and 45th Parallel Cafe and distributed during Spring Break to school-age children. Food Relief has since transitioned to focus on providing meals for seniors. Donate online at sbcongregational.org.
What does this work mean to you?
“It is very important to us that this outreach be a two-pronged benefit. Sort of a win-win,” writes Jim Muennich. “It benefits locally owned small businesses, namely the restaurants and their employees, who were the first businesses to be impacted. It is also a way to reach out to that part of our community, the elderly, who are most at risk from this virus. The elderly are going to be the last group who will be given the ‘all clear’ to go outside and mingle with their neighbors and resume their normal lives. This is our way of showing that we are still here. We still care about you. You’re not alone.”
What does the work mean to the community?
“In a situation like this there are always people who want to help. They want to volunteer. Unfortunately, we are all asked to isolate. We hope that people who donate will feel like they are doing something positive. Doing something that is making a difference. Feeling like you’re not being able to help others can be stressful and depressing. Everyone feels better when they know that they are making a difference. Our cost to purchase 175 sandwiches twice a week is about $3,500 a week. Checks can be made payable to: Suttons Bay Congregational Church, (put Food Relief in the memo) P.O. Box 70, Suttons Bay, MI 49682.
How has your life changed during the pandemic?
Like everyone, this is something we’ve never been through. You don’t have to have the virus to be a victim. Everyone is being emotionally affected. Everyone is having good days and bad days navigating the changes in our daily lives.
About our Leelanau Essentials series
They are doctors, nurses and healthcare workers. They stock the shelves, slice the deli meat, and run the registers at grocery stores, they deliver your meals curbside, delicately pinching the paper bag between gloved fingers. They are the EMS first responders, the firemen and the cops. They are the distilleries that turn spirit byproduct into hand sanitizer. They drive semi trucks and delivery trucks and bring packages and food. They are postal workers. They run the food banks and the church pantries. They keep the school cafeterias open to make sure the needy families get breakfasts and lunch. They pick up our recycling and our garbage. They watch our children, and they care for our elderly. They are the farmworkers—both with and without documents—who harvest our crops.
Even as our community and our society shut down and we stay home to socially distance ourselves, these essential workers of Leelanau County show up every day and walk to the front lines to fight for us in this world war against a murderous pandemic. Let us honor our Leelanau Essentials.
Dear readers—who would you like to nominate for our Leelanau Essentials profile series? Do they have a compelling story they’re willing to share? Have they proven themselves essential to the community in recent weeks? Can they send us a photo of themselves and answer the following questions: What does my job mean to me? What does it mean to the community? How has my life changed during the coronavirus? Send submissions to editorial@GlenArborSun.com.
