Vassar’s Kitchen Staff Pitches In to Help a Local Nonprofit Feed Folks in Poughkeepsie
When school is in session, Vassar’s Campus Dining staff prepares about 6,800 meals for students, faculty, staff, and visitors daily. That number recently increased when the College answered a call for assistance from Dutchess Outreach, a local nonprofit agency that provides meals to unhoused residents and others in the City of Poughkeepsie.
Dutchess Outreach serves more than 500 lunches and dinners five days a week at its own facility, and provides about 100 breakfasts, lunches, and dinners seven days a week to The Pods, a homeless shelter in the city. But when the agency decided to renovate its kitchen facilities, it needed to find a community partner to take over the task, said Evelina Knodel, Director of Operations at Dutchess Outreach.
Knodel said her agency already had established a relationship with Vassar’s Dining Services through ongoing conversations about providing healthy, locally grown food. “So, when we had to close our kitchen, Vassar jumped in,” she said. “They have an amazing dining staff, and we are grateful to them for taking on this task.”
Dutchess Outreach is reimbursing the College for the cost of the extra food, but Knodel said she was grateful to the Dining Services staff for pitching in to prepare the extra meals. Vassar began providing the meals in mid-August and will continue to do so until Dutchess Outreach re-opens its kitchen facilities in early October.
Dining Services Head Chef Mike Conlin said he and his staff were eager to help. “There are four or five of us involved in preparing these meals every day,” Conlin said as he oversaw the preparation of a few hundred cheesesteaks. “When they heard where the food would be going, they totally bought into doing the extra work.”
For more information about Dutchess Outreach and the services the agency provides, visit dutchessoutreach.org.