This month marks 50 years that Meals on Wheels Yolo County has been nourishing tens of thousands of adults through its home-delivered food and Café Yolo social dining room.

The half-century of service has helped provide a safety net for home-bound seniors during an increasingly challenging financial time.

"Today, they brought chicken enchiladas, which I really like," said West Sacramento recipient Janelle Dennis, showing CBS Sacramento her delivery on Thursday.

Right now, MOW Yolo is serving about 1,200 seniors.

Dennis said she is beyond grateful to be one of them, because every little bit is a big help.

"I need a hip replacement right now and it's hard for me to even get around," Dennis said.

She's been part of the program for two years.

"It helps us with food, being able to eat good food every day," Dennis said.

More than the meals, what most of these isolated seniors look forward to most is the human connections and relationships that come with the deliveries.

"They knock on the door, they are so glad to see me and I'm glad to see them, too," Dennis said. "There's not really anybody else I can depend on. But Meals on Wheels, I can depend on."

Thanks to dedicated volunteers, the meals are distributed all throughout Yolo County every morning.

"It's always been rooted in community, this effort for at Meals on Wheels Yolo County. It's really people taking care of people, and that's what makes it so meaningful and magical," said executive director Joy Cohan.

Yolo County is home to some of the highest levels of poverty and food insecurity in California.

It's estimated based on the 2020 census that more than 8,000 seniors are living in poverty or are food insecure countywide.

"Coming out of the pandemic, I think food insecurity issues were illuminated for all demographics in the community, but particularly so for seniors. That's now gotten coupled with the 'silver tsunami,' with the Baby Boomer generation. All of the baby boomers now are age 60 plus," said Cohan. "We're quickly coming up on there being more seniors than children in the community in Yolo County, and so the need for our services just continues to escalate. It's just never been a lull since the pandemic."

Cohan said that in the years since emergency funding from the COVID-19 pandemic has dried up, the need has only continued to grow.

In her view, 2025 is the most challenging year for the nonprofit to date.

Right now, there are about 200 seniors on the waitlist for MOW Yolo.

"The scale-up has been the biggest challenge of all," Cohan said. "We've had over 300% growth just in the last four years."

Still, she is grateful that during her time as executive director, they have still been able to expand their routes despite the challenging financial times.

"Going back four years ago, we weren't serving many of the rural areas, but now we have a route that goes up the Capay Valley, one down to Clarksburg, up to Dunnigan. There's really no address in Yolo County right now where you can't theoretically get Meals on Wheels delivered. Of course, right now we have a wait list, however, because of a lack of funds," Cohan said.

They are racing to keep up in light of declining donations and potential cuts to federal food programs.

About 15% of the nonprofit's annual funding comes through the Older Americans Act, which is primarily federally funded.

"We're running very close to the edge of having to join other Meals on Wheels programs across the country and cutting seniors off the program. A loss of the federal funding in whole or in part would certainly make that day come sooner, and that would be a very unfortunate thing," Cohan said.

Meals on Wheels Yolo is asking the community to step up and volunteer or donate to keep these mobile meals moving for another 50 years.

To celebrate their anniversary, they are hoping to reach their goal of 50 sponsored seniors on their waitlist. Learn how to help on their website.