The MANNA Programs:
Commmunity Meals (Soup Kitchen)
Assistance & Advocacy (Food Pantry),
and Senior Community Café (Weekend Senior Meals On Wheels)

Goal

Provide for the basic human needs of Hartford’s most vulnerable citizens: the homeless, children and families in crisis, and low-income frail seniors. Our long term goal is to introduce our clients to the network of Hands On Hartford programs and community resources and, ultimately, a future marked by self-sufficiency.

Why MANNA Is Important

Hartford is the 2nd poorest city in the United States. Homelessness, hunger, and poverty afflict our city in large numbers. Cultural barriers, chronic unemployment, lack of education, substance abuse, or a combination thereof, can prevent many people from overcoming these extreme conditions. The MANNA programs help Hartford residents living below the poverty line by:

• Preventing hunger among the elderly, children and families through meals served at elderly housing centers, by operating a soup kitchen, and by providing provisions from our food pantry.
• Providing weekend backpacks filled with kid-friendly food to over 200 school kids who might otherwise go hungry on the weekends.

How It Works

MANNA (Meals, Assistance, Neighbors, Nurturing, Advocacy) offers the following services:

• MANNA Community Meals is a soup kitchen located at 45 Church Street in the Parish House of Christ Church Cathedral, serving homeless adults, the working poor, and elderly people.
  • Lunch is served each weekday, plus dinners on Monday, Tuesday, and Friday nights. The Friday Night Dinner is a joint effort between Hands On Hartford and Christ Church Cathedral's Church Street Eats.
  • MANNA Community Meals also offers community lunch or dinners on twelve holidays throughout the year (New Year's Day, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, Valentine's Day, St. Patrick's Day, Easter, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve, Christmas, and New Year's Eve) which bring clients, staff and volunteers together for the sharing of food and fellowship.
• MANNA Assistance and Advocacy is a family intervention program that operates a food pantry and provides security deposit assistance, referrals, and other basic services to assist Hartford's low-income individuals and families.
  • The program is located at One Buckingham Street, in space provided by South Congregational Church. It aids children and families in time of distress and steers families away from the constant threat of crisis and toward the economic spirit of the community.
• MANNA Senior Community Café is a weekend nutrition and social program for Hartford’s low-income and disabled elderly population. It is the city’s only weekend program providing meals and social interaction for low-income seniors.
  • Weekend congregate meals are provided to seniors at Betty Knox Center on Woodland Street and at Smith Towers in the Charter Oak neighborhood. The program also provides meal delivery to homebound seniors. Seniors who participate in this program have an easier time making ends meet, maintaining proper nutrition and avoiding the pitfalls of social isolation.
• MANNA Backpack Program is a program which provides backpacks filled with kid-friendly food and are distributed weekly to elementary school students identified by the school staff as particularly needy. The backpacks help the kids (and their families) put food on the table for the weekend.

Role of Volunteers

Volunteers play two important roles at MANNA: they help with operations and they provide positive interactions and support to our city’s poor, elderly, and displaced residents. There are many different ways volunteers can help out at MANNA. Some of the opportunities include packing backpacks, organizing at the food pantry, and preparing and serving meals at our soup kitchen and Senior Community Café

Many of the clients at our program sites enjoy the company and relationships of volunteers. The elderly, in particular, gain from those personal relationships that can develop. These relationships help them avoid the trap of social isolation that is pervasive among seniors, especially those living alone.

Resources for Volunteers

Community Meals Resources
Cooking for 150 Recipe: American Chop-Suey (Macaroni and Beef) (pdf)
Next level service: Ice Cream Sundae Bar (pdf)
Community Meals Donation Wish List (pdf)

Assistance and Advocacy Resources
A&A and Senior Community Café Donation Wish List and Support Guide (pdf)

Impact

MANNA embraces a disciplined approach to track and measure participation and impact in our programs. In 2010, MANNA provided:

• 14,515 lunches and take-home cold pack dinners to seniors at our community meal sites: Betty Knox Housing Complex, 141 Woodland Street in the Asylum Hill neighborhood; and Smith Towers, 80 Charter Oak Avenue in the Sheldon/Charter Oak section of Hartford.
• 11,910 meals delivered by volunteers to home-bound elderly too frail to travel to the cafes.
• 34,835 meals to 2,397 homeless and low-income adults at the soup kitchen at Christ Church Cathedral on Church Street.
• More than 112,000 pounds of groceries to 797 households through the food pantry at One Buckingham Street (South Congregational Church). Most families using the food pantry were single mothers with more than one child.
• 1,714 meals to homeless and/or low-income people on New Year’s Day, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, Easter Sunday, Memorial Day, Fourth of July, Labor Day, Thanksgiving and Christmas.
• $23,399 in funds for security deposits, furniture and/or appliances to 163 individuals and families.
• 712 backpacks filled with food delivered to approximately 75 students

If you’d like to support these programs please click this button!