At the start of May, the Fayetteville Senior Center began a program where it would prepare and then send a weekend’s worth of meals to any senior citizen in the community who requested it.

And it’s turned into quite a hit, as by Memorial Day, up to 100 meals were getting put together, with potential for further growth.

It was the brainchild of the senior center’s director, Janet Best, who wanted to find a way to serve her fellow community members in the days and weeks after the COVID-19 outbreak.

“It’s our way of helping out, and this is something they look forward to every week,” she said.

Back on March 13, the center, a non-profit organization unaffiliated with the village of Fayetteville and located at 584 East Genesee Street, was closed, considered a “non-essential” business.

That designation changed a week later, but when it reopened, Best had to furlough two of her co-workers and operate alone, opening just three days a week from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m as opposed to the center’s normal five-day-a-week schedule.

Often, said Best, her time was spent on a “hotline” answering phone calls from some of the center’s 500 members expressing their concerns and fears and also seeking information about issues such as stimulus checks.

“I help because a lot of them live alone, and no one is checking on them,” said Best.

It was from those conversations that the idea for the meal delivery service sprung. Best said she put together 76 meals on that first weekend, distributing them from the center so that customers could have home-cooked food for dinner the following Saturday and Sunday.

For $10, each senior citizen who signs up on a weekly basiss gets those two meals in a take-out bag similar to what restaurants are doing with curbside take-outs, complete with instructions on how to reheat the food plus some candy as a bonus.

Best said she has received plenty of help from community members in distributing the meals, and added that the program could continue even after the COVID-19 crisis subsides.

This program augments a meal program run by the town of Manlius at its Senior Activity Centre, where to-go meals are available Monday through Friday at noon at a cost of $5 for members and $5.50 for non-members, but those are single meals, not the two-day package available in Fayetteville.

More information on the Fayetteville program can be found at faysrctr.org.