Each weekday morning a fleet of volunteers heads out from the Martha’s Vineyard Hospital, their cars filled with packaged meals headed for households across the Island. The pink placards attached to windshields, sun visors and rear windows identify the volunteers’ cars as Meals on Wheels delivery vehicles.

For nearly six years I have been one of more than 100 Island Meals on Wheels drivers. I volunteered at the beginning of the pandemic, feeling compelled to do something — anything — to help my community at a time when the world felt confused and helpless. I have continued to volunteer because I have made friends with the people on my route, and through them learned the importance of Meals on Wheels as one strand in the web of services that support our community.

For more than 50 years Meals on Wheels has provided nutritionally balanced meals to Island seniors at no cost to recipients. In the 2025 fiscal year, nearly 300 Islanders received meals. According to surveys conducted by Elder Services of Cape Cod and the Islands (which runs Meals on Wheels), more than 80 per cent of meals recipients report that their home delivered meal is their main meal of the day, comprising roughly half their daily caloric intake.

Ensuring our seniors have enough to eat stands on its own, but many recipients have told me that the daily check-in provided by delivery drivers is as important to them as the meals we provide. Eighteen per cent of recipients report that the Meals on Wheels volunteer is the only person they see most days (according to the Elder Services survey).

My Meals on Wheels friends have told me stories that support the survey results. One gentleman who lives alone in a modest house in Edgartown and has grown increasingly frail over the years has told me that, without the daily visits, he fears no one would know if something were to happen to him.

Meals on Wheels may not serve as many individuals as some of the more prominent players in the Vineyard’s food access service web (SNAP, the Island Food Pantry or Island Grown Initiative to name a few) but it provides food — and companionship — to people who find it difficult to take advantage of those programs.

“Food pantries and SNAP are both supplemental programs meaning that neither is designed to meet 100 per cent of a community’s needs,” said Merrick Carreiro, the food equity director at Island Grown Initiative, in the lead story in the Oct. 31 Vineyard Gazette. “When one piece of the food equity puzzle is missing, it puts untenable strain on the programs that remain.”

Meals on Wheels is one of those puzzle pieces and it is struggling to secure enough funding to provide its services. More than half of its budget comes from state and federal government sources, the rest must be raised from private philanthropy.

In May 2025, Barnstable eliminated Meals on Wheels delivery on Tuesdays in response to funding cuts. As of today, Martha’s Vineyard has not reduced its Meals on Wheels services. But the threat looms and the need keeps growing.

The Greater Boston Food Bank’s fifth annual food access report released in June showed that 34 per cent of respondents across Dukes, Nantucket and Barnstable counties reported that they experienced food insecurity in 2024 — a 14 per cent increase from 2023 and the largest regional increase in Massachusetts.

Please consider what you can do to help keep our precious Vineyard safety net strong. Donations to Elder Services of Cape Cod and the Islands in any amount will make a difference. If you have time to spare, they are always looking for drivers — even volunteering once a month will help make our seniors’ lives less difficult and less lonely.

If you would benefit from Meals on Wheels services, call the Vineyard office at 508-693-4393.

Marta Van Ranst lives in Oak Bluffs.