Hotel giving free meals to elderly in local community
The Riverside Hotel is providing free Sunday dinners to close to 50 elderly people in the community in order to ‘give back’ during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Staff at the hotel have rolled up their sleeves in order to help elderly and vulnerable people in the community by providing roast dinners which are being delivered to their homes every Sunday.
General Manager of the hotel, Mark Ballantine, told The Sligo Champion the idea came about after the hotel’s normal offering to the public was vastly impacted due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
The hotel management took the decision to close its normal functioning on March 15 th and liaised with staff in relation to their welfare and worked with them on an individual basis regarding isolation and decisions to continue to work or not.
“Our offering evolved so some staff could enter isolation and we stood by staff on that, and reduced the offering to match staff reductions,” explained the Australian native.
Though not open to the general public or tourists, the hotel remains open to those who require accommodation for essential purposes.
“We were certain that we would be keeping the rooms open. Sligo is going to need those rooms throughout the crisis, whether that’s for tradespeople, frontline staff, or professionals who have essential travel to Sligo.”
Mark says the community has relied on the hotel and supported it with their custom before the pandemic and now staff and management wanted to ‘give back’.
“We thought about how we could look after elderly people living by themselves and get food to them in the most responsible way.”
After liaising with An Garda Síochána and Community Garda Liaison Officer, Mark Connor a plan was hatched, and now, close to 50 elderly people are receiving Sunday roasts to their door.
“Gardaí know who are vulnerable and its being delivered in a safe way. It’s something we plan on doing every Sunday. For some people it may be the only contact they have when they have a chat to gardaí who are delivering,” said Mr Ballantine.
Completely free of charge to the people receiving them, the food is bought in by the hotel and a chef prepares the meals each Sunday under strict HSE guidelines.
Speaking in relation to the reduction in staff being employed at the hotel, the general manager spoke glowingly of his team’s understanding.
“Everyone has taken a hit but it’s a very family orientated team and everyone understands it’s a short term problem, they’re all long term staff here.”