HANNIBAL, Missouri — The Hannibal Nutrition Center is suspending its in-house meals and cutting down on its home meal delivery services, blaming a funding crisis between the government shutdown and a regional policy dispute.

“State and federal funds have been delayed, food costs are soaring, and labor prices are rising,” said long-time HNC Board Member Steve Carroll. “We’ve been struggling, but we’ve reached a point where we must make decisions we never thought we would have to make.”

Starting next Monday, Nov. 24, they’ll be cutting home-delivered meals down to just three days a week: Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.

The last in-person meal at the center will be their annual Thanksgiving dinner this Thursday, Nov. 20.

“Serving a hot, nutritious meal is, of course, our main function,” said HNC Executive Director Margee Tucker. “However, we’ve always been so much more than that. We are a place where seniors gather with friends and share stories. For those who receive home-delivered meals, our drivers are sometimes the only person they see that day. For many, it’s the reason they get out of bed. This is a tremendous loss for our senior citizens.”

HNC says its funding comes in part through the Older Americans Act (OAA) and is distributed regionally by the Area Agency on Aging. Center officials say the federal funding they get is being withheld until they resolve a regional dispute over policies and procedures.

“We’ve been working to resolve these issues—and we believe we have—but the process takes time,” Carroll said. “We can’t wait that long. We are in a crisis now.”

In the meantime, the nutrition center is looking to raise $100,000 to restore services.

The center says a government contractor will be giving out frozen meals once a week to the senior Medicaid patients the nutrition center was serving.

“In addition to serving about 1,300 congregate meals and delivering 4,100 meals to homebound seniors each month, HNC also provides 2,400 meals monthly to Medicaid recipients ages 60 and over. Those Medicaid meals will no longer come from HNC; instead, seniors will receive frozen meals once a week from a government contractor,” a press release from HNC said on Monday.

You can read the full release from HNC in the pdf embedded above.