Meals on Wheels suffers theft of generator

Sonora man donates a generator back to the nonprofit program

A disheartening theft from Tuolumne County’s

Meals on Wheels program on Thursday also served as a reminder about how members of the community support each other through times of adversity.

An $840 Troy Bilt 5500watt generator, can of gasoline and extension cord were stolen from a fenced-in loading dock at the Tuolumne County Senior Center on Greenley Road in Sonora sometime between Wednesday night and Thursday morning.

“Everybody was just, we were shocked that somebody would have done that, we couldn’t believe it,” said Kristi Conforti, executive director of Sierra Senior Providers Inc., the nonprofit organization that runs the Meals on Wheels program out of the center.

Conforti said the organization’s head cook discovered the items missing about 5:30 a.m. Thursday while doing her morning prep work. The last person to leave the center the previous night was about 6:30 p.m.

The loading dock in the back of the center is surrounded by metal fencing to keep people out, but Conforti said the cook saw that a tarp covering the fencing to conceal the stored items

had been moved in a certain way that didn’t look right.

Conforti said she went to investigate further and discovered the fencing had been cut in a “perfect, rectangular square.”

“Just about the size of the generator,” Conforti said.

The generator was being loaned to Sierra Seniors Providers by John Maciel, of the Sonora Sunrise Rotary Club, to keep the program up and running during power outages that have been imposed by Pacific Gas and Electric Co. over the past couple of years due to fire risk.

Conforti said the organization was planning to purchase the generator from Maciel for $100 to use for future public safety power shutoffs, as they are referred to by PG&E, which are expected to become a more regular part of life in fire-prone areas.

“We talked about that last week and then it got stolen,” she said. “I felt so bad.”

The organization uses a county-provided generator to keep the refrigerators running when the power’s out, while the one that was stolen would help power their packaging machine for meals, ice machines for keeping food cold on deliveries, and lights for kitchen workers.

After contacting the Sonora Police Department, which sent out officers to investigate, Conforti posted about the incident on Facebook to let people know in case they encountered someone trying to sell the generator.

“There were a lot of people who were angry that someone would do that to a senior meal program,” she said.

Jake Fuller, 29, of Sonora, heard about the incident from his friend, Heidi Lupo, and decided to do something about it.

Fuller, owner of Mother Lode Tree Service, had purchased a number of spare generators to help anyone who had trouble finding one ahead of the outages due to stores selling out fast and gave one to Sierra Senior Providers.

“It shows there’s good people in this world, there’s good people in this community,” Conforti said. “For every bad guy, there’s hopefully a good guy plus more.”

Conforti described Fuller’s gesture as heroic, but he downplayed it as a simple act of good manners.

Fuller said the generator cost between $400 and $500 but will provide enough power for what they need. He doesn’t know anyone who benefits from the Meals on Wheels program, but he’s aware of the work it does in the community.”

“This one kind of struck a nerve with them being elderly and that the operation is based on volunteers,” he said. “It felt like a low blow and made me want to step up immediately any way I could.”

Sonora Police Officer John Bowly said the crime is being investigated as a felony burglary, though the department currently doesn’t have any leads on possible suspects.

Bowly said the lack of suspects or physical evidence to lead them to a suspect has put the investigation at a standstill, but he encouraged anyone with more information to contact them at (209) 5328143.