Each day, Meals on Wheels of Southwest Ohio and Northern Kentucky delivers more than 4,600 meals to seniors across a 13-county region. Drivers collectively travel about 50,000 miles each month to ensure seniors receive nutritious food, points of connection and wellness checks. Reaching nearly 11,000 seniors each year, essential services are driven by Meals on Wheels’ team of 145 staff members. Still, the work cannot be done without volunteers who dedicate their time serving their aging neighbors.
Northern Kentucky resident Steve Tucker is one such volunteer. He retired from a career in real estate in 2021 and knew he wanted to spend much of his time doing volunteer work. He likes working with people and cares a great deal for seniors’ well-being. Meals on Wheels, he found, made an ideal fit.
“I could easily go and just pack meals somewhere, but I wanted to be out where I’d actually be coming in contact with the people that are benefitting from the service,” Steve says.
In four years, Steve has logged over 750 hours as a Meals on Wheels volunteer. He has assembled snack boxes that accompany every meal delivery, organized premade meals to support the distribution team and delivered birthday bags for seniors who may not receive gifts or calls anymore.
Making deliveries in person is Steve’s particular favorite. Every week, he arrives at the Meals on Wheels main office and production facility in Cincinnati and checks in with the volunteer engagement team. They have his route and deliveries already prepped. Sometimes it’s meals, sometimes it’s birthday bags and sometimes it’s commodity boxes full of shelf-stable items to supplement seniors’ food selection at home. Then, he hits the road.
Steve gives each senior a call when he’s about five or 10 minutes away. Each senior has a regular day of the week they can expect a delivery, so it’s not a surprise when he rings them. He makes the delivery and stays to chat.
“I never try to act like I’m in a big hurry to move on if they need to talk for a little while,” he says. “They’re so nice and they’re so thankful when you bring stuff to them. And they almost all live by themselves. So, you want to talk to them and get to know them a little bit.” he says.
Steve recognizes he may be the only social touchpoint a senior has for the whole day or even the whole week. It’s an integral part of the Meals on Wheels service; the delivery gives drivers the chance to check on a senior’s overall well-being. Are they healthy and safe? Have they suffered any falls? Is there a utility out? Drivers are trained to spot something amiss, from a broken air conditioner to signs of possible abuse or neglect. It gives the organization the chance to intervene or connect them to additional services they provide, like social and protective services, transportation or pet support.
Even if nothing is amiss, there is still tremendous value in the steady, reliable check-in—it is a reminder to seniors that they are not alone.
Recently, Steve had trouble recently getting a hold of a senior on his route. He called a few times but got no response. He flagged it, and Meals on Wheels staff did a series of follow-up calls to check on them, per protocol. The team eventually connected with the senior and confirmed it was a pesky new cell phone setting that had prevented Steve from reaching her.
“She’s a really nice lady,” Steve says. “When I delivered her meals to her yesterday, she already had an Easter card for me. She thanked me and said how much she appreciates everything. It’s nice.”
Working with seniors is important to Steve, especially when they face the challenges of hunger. Feeding America, a nationwide network of food banks, estimates over 750,000 people are facing hunger in Kentucky. As many as 20 percent of seniors in the Commonwealth experience limited or uncertain access to adequate food, according to 2025 data provided by Meals on Wheels America. Challenges with mobility, transportation, medical conditions and social support contribute to that uncertainty.
Steve often sees those challenge during his routes. He can tell if a senior is going through a tough time. “Sometimes it’s bad luck, bad health, things you couldn’t help. All of a sudden, your life just changes.”
Meals on Wheels Volunteer Manager Tammy Hitchcock engages folks like Steve every day. She recognizes the impact one person can make when they understand the need to support our elderly neighbors.
She says, “Steve has a passion and commitment to service whenever and for whatever reason needed. His weekly dedication for the last four years to the senior community’s needs goes above and beyond the expectations of a volunteer.”
Steve is humble and does not consider himself exceptional—he simply sees a need, an urgent one, and volunteers to be part of the solution. He says, “My contribution is very, very tiny, but I think every little bit helps. I realize it’s just a very small contribution to the overall picture.”
Small contributions, like volunteering to deliver meals or pack snack boxes, are in fact quite powerful. Meals on Wheels can feed one senior for one year for approximately the same cost as spending one day in the hospital. Home-delivered meal service promotes independence and well-being, enabling seniors to meet their nutritional needs while aging in place with dignity.
“Volunteers like Steve help raise awareness of the challenges and needs the seniors are facing on a day-to-day basis in local communities, with the hope that others will recognize this need and begin to help,” says Tammy.
Meals on Wheels’ community of volunteers includes over 5,700 people. They all play a critical role in supporting the organization’s services—which go beyond meal delivery to include transportation services, social and protective services, pet support, social connection programs and management of the OTR Senior Center in Cincinnati. Volunteers assemble weekly snack boxes, create and deliver birthday bags to seniors, pack pet food for clients’ dogs and cats, organize premade meals for distribution, make friendly check-in phone calls and spend time at senior centers.
April is Volunteer Appreciation Month. Meals on Wheels extends its deepest gratitude to the people who volunteer their time and hearts to our mission. We cannot provide critical support to our region’s seniors without the help of our community.
Volunteer opportunities are flexible and family-friendly. We welcome corporate groups, religious groups, civic organizations, schools, families and individuals. Visit www.muchmorethanameal.org to learn more about the Meals on Wheels mission, and contact Tammy Hitchcock at 513-244-0668 or hitchcock@muchmorethanameal.org to start volunteering!
