Lunch Break gives people in need a real break - TrentonMonitor
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Lunch Break gives people in need a real break

Lunch Break, Monmouth County’s first soup kitchen that was founded 27 years ago, is a volunteer-driven, non-profit organization that provides hot meals and other critical assistance such as clothing and services to those in need.

Located at 121 Drs. James Parker Blvd. in Red Bank, the services that Lunch Break offers include:

• Free, hot lunches are served every Monday through Friday from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m., including delivery of meals to more approxi­mately 20 to 25 local homebound residents six days a week;

• Each Saturday, parishioners from St. Leo the Great Parish, Lincroft, serve bag lunches on the Lunch Break campus;

• Hot breakfast is served every Saturday from 10 a.m. to noon;

• Emergency food provisions are made available to more than 190 families each month through the food pantry;

• Distribution of food baskets and toys during Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays;

• Collect, organize and distribute new and slightly used clothing to more than 350 families each month.

• Various social service providers are present on the Lunch Break campus at various times throughout the month.

Gwendolyn Love, executive director of Lunch Break, said that with three paid persons on the staff, the agency relies heavily on the talents, dedication and commitment of volunteers to assist in imple­menting services. Volunteers are currently needed both on-site and off-site to conduct the following activities or work on various committees including fundraising, food drives, publishing the newsletter, administrative, shopping, outreach, gardening, as well as for other day-to-day activities in the soup kitchen, pantry and clothing service areas.

To learn more about Lunch Break, visit www.lunchbreak.org or call 732-747-8577, Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. and Saturdays from 9 a.m. to noon.

Does your parish, school or charitable group need volunteer assistance? Put out a call for volunteers through the Faith In Action feature of The Monitor. Send all requests toMonitor-News@dioceseoftrenton.org. Type FAITH IN ACTION into the subject line.