October 2016
Volume 4 • Issue 10
Tri-Cities Food Bank expands to West Richland BY JESSICA HOEFER for Senior Times
Seniors Times Expo set for Oct. 18
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Richland woman finds joy in card making
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Tri-City area holiday bazaar listings
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save the date
Saturday, Nov. 5 9:30 - 11:30 a.m. Veterans Day Parade Van Giesen St., West Richland
The Tri-Cities Food Bank will open up a distribution center in West Richland this month to keep up with the area’s growing demand. Seeing a seven percent increase in the number of families served each year since 2006, officials with the Tri-Cities Food Bank know the facility will be well used. “We ran some studies and set up a food bank at (LifePoint church in West Richland). At each of the different offerings, we had different people there. The first time about 60 people came, and the next time four months later, 40 people came, but they were different people,” said Bill Kitchen, executive director of the TriCities Food Bank. “So we said, ‘Let’s stop all of this testing and open a facility.’” The West Richland food bank will operate out of the city’s senior center at 616 N. 60th Ave. two days a week: Thursday night and Saturday morning. The tentative start date is Oct. 13. “What we’ll do is load up food in a truck from the central distribution center (in Kennewick) and drive it over there, except frozen food. We’re going to establish a couple of freezers at the senior center and a cooler for dairy products,” Kitchen said. “We’re excited about it, and we’re going to see how it goes.” The Tri-Cities Food Bank also kicked off two programs this year to help the elderly. Ten months ago, it started the government-subsidized Commodity Supplemental Food Program. In addition to receiving boxes of food every other week, low-income seniors get another 30 pounds once a month. “It started with about 30 people and now it’s up to over 100,” Kitchen said. uBANK, Page 8
Donna McClure, lead cook, pours sautéed mushrooms over chicken in Senior Life Resources Northwest’s new kitchen on Fowler Drive in Richland.
New kitchen better equipped to serve Mid-Columbia seniors BY KRISTINA LORD editor@tcjournal.biz
A new commercial kitchen that serves as the hub for cooking hundreds of warm and nutritious meals a day for Benton and Franklin counties’ senior citizens opened last month in Richland. “This is the nicest kitchen I’ve ever been in,” gushed Chef Brian Kinner, food services manager for Senior Life Resources Northwest. The 4,300-square-foot kitchen on Fowler Street opened Sept. 6 after spending a year operating out of the Country Gentleman restaurant in Kennewick. Prior to that, meals were made at the Pasco Senior Center kitchen, a cramped 500-square-foot cooking space, for about 15 years.
The new $1 million building includes about $400,000 in kitchen equipment, purchased with $200,000 from the state Legislature and about $175,000 locally contributed. More donations are needed to finish the kitchen’s adjacent café and to replenish the agency’s diminished reserve funds. Naming rights are available for a $150,000 donation, said Marcee Woffinden, nutrition services director for Senior Life Resources Northwest.
Serving two counties, homebound seniors
The kitchen bustles with activity Monday through Friday.
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Longtime Kennewick jeweler still crafting custom pieces
BY DORI O’NEAL for Senior Times
Wes Door, who turns 92 this month, has been a jeweler and inventor for most of his life. He owned a storefront in downtown Kennewick for many years before moving his jewelry business to his home at 2214 W. Fourth Ave., in Kennewick in 1970. The Tri-City Regional Chamber of Commerce recently honored him for being a longtime member of the organization and attending just about every monthly meeting.
But though his business savvy and patented inventions have kept him in business since 1948, this lively senior citizen doesn’t slow down much after he closes his shop for the day. He’s an avid Tri-City Americans hockey fan, invents jewelry repair gadgets that are sold worldwide, has been a member of the Kennewick Police department’s volunteer CHIPS, or Citizens Helping In Police Service, program for two decades, is a charter member of the local Toastmasters club, and is active in the Richland chapter of the International Folk Dance Club. uJEWELER, Page 7
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