Meal service is set to begin January 2

Area senior citizens will have a new place to gather for noon lunches, it was announced last week.  

The new meal site for Glenwood area seniors will now be at The Village, a restaurant and bar located just across the street from the Glenwood Senior Center on Franklin Street and 1st Ave. SE.  Lunches will be served from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.

Geoff Bruzek, owner of The Village said he will begin providing “congregate senior meals” on site starting on Monday, Jan. 2.  The Village will also provide the lunches for the “Meals on Wheels” program, which serves senior citizens living in Pope County and utilizes volunteer drivers to deliver those noon meals daily.  Meals on Wheels is a program that prepares and delivers nutritious meals to older adults and people with disabilities who are unable to make the food for themselves or travel to a meal site.

A senior lunch menu at The Village will be published weekly in the Pope County Tribune & Starbuck Times starting in January.  

Bruzek said he agreed to have The Village become the new senior meal site with the recent announcement that the Glenwood Senior Center would be closing.  That building was purchased recently by American Solutions for Business (ASB), but there was a five-year plan that would allow seniors to access the building for the meal site.   

Dean Clausen, president of the Glenwood Senior Center board, said last week that the decision to close was based on finances.  With total participants at noon declining, hosting the meal site became a financial liability, he said.  The Senior Center board did have an agreement with Nutritional Services, Inc.  (NSI) to use the site until June of 2023, but it was mutually decided to end that agreement early with the program moving to The Village.   The Center also had a 5-year agreement with ABS that said seniors could utilize the property until June 30, 2023, with an option of vacating early.  Clausen said the plan is to We vacate the premises no later than February 1, Clausen said.  

“We had explored moving the meal service to Central Square,” said Larry Zavadil founder and CEO of ASB, “but the provider (NSI) wanted either a better site or to prepare the meals in Alexandria and drop them in Glenwood.  Moving the site to The Village in Glenwood was a much better solution,” he added.

ASB bought the building as a gathering place for larger groups and its location next to ASB’s current building at 102 Franklin St. (the old PC Tribune building), was a benefit.  “The plan is to renovate the former Senior Center building and use it as a large meeting space as well as a place to conduct training for employees,” said ASB president Justin Zavadil.  

Clausen also stated that the board is “investigating a method for returning funds back to the community.  The funds were acquired through the sale of the building, which was originally funded largely by community donations.  

Seniors who want more information about congregate dining at The Village or the Meals on Wheels program, should contact The Village at 320-634-9961.