A delivery of hope (and food)

By Ben Olson
Reader Staff

There’s a theory that sandwiches taste better when someone else makes them. I wonder what the consensus is on delivered meals?

Since 2019, the students at Lake Pend Oreille High School have teamed up with the Bonner Community Food Bank to deliver home-cooked meals to community members in need on Christmas Eve. On Dec. 24, more than two dozen volunteer drivers showed up to the Methodist Church in Sandpoint to help deliver more than 50 meals packed by student volunteers, delivering them to homes in Sandpoint, Sagle, Careywood, Heron, Clark Fork and other locations.

Student volunteers gather with Randy Wilhelm, left center, on Christmas Eve. Courtesy photo.

The tradition started with a meeting between LPOHS teacher Randy Wilhelm and Food Bank Executive Director Debbie Love in 2019.

“I had just met with Randy and we’d just collaborated on an art piece for the Food Bank lobby,” Love told the Reader. “He was talking about one of his students doing a food project with the Food Bank and it just came out.”

Because there were several LPOHS seniors on the Community Supplemental Food Program, along with the low-income seniors in the community, Love and Wilhelm decided they wanted to prepare a meal for them and deliver it.

“A lot of them don’t have family around,” Love said. 

Volunteers Tom and Nancy Renk receive their delivery assignment from student volunteers. Photo by Ben Olson.

“We have a culture club group at school,” Wilhelm added. “They’re the ones who came and helped play waitress. Then Bonner Homeless Transitions got involved and, through the Food Bank, helped come out to hand out meals.”

Love told the Reader members of the Ponderay Rotary Club volunteered as well.

This year, the meals were prepared by someone who knows a lot about feeding those in need: Wendy Franck, who formerly owned the Hoot Owl Cafe.

More student volunteers help with the delivery and food service. Courtesy photo.

“She prepared them all,” Love said. “It was really nice to have a professional — an expert to prepare these meals with the proper portions. She’s had experience doing it through the Hoot Owl, but she also does the soup kitchen on Monday nights.”

Franck’s homemade meals included mashed potatoes, gravy, turkey, pumpkin pie, stuffing and green beans.

After the deliveries, several of the volunteers returned to the church to break bread with other community members for another couple dozen meals.

“We had a client there who was so grateful she started playing the piano,” Love said. “It was wonderful. She was playing Christmas carols and everyone was singing along. It felt like one big family.”

Wilhelm said since he’s retiring from education this year, he’s hoping the program continues every year.

“It’s pretty awesome that people give up their Christmas Eve to go deliver meals,” he said. “It’s a good program.”