Holiday Fund: St. Anthony's Dining Room welcomes all (December 08, 2004)

By Nicole Boroff

Special to the Almanac

Max Torres, operations manager at St. Anthony's Padua Dining Room near Menlo Park, has a philosophical resignation to the reality of this economy.

"Nowadays, with rents so high, money doesn't go a long way," he says. "Good jobs are not available for unskilled workers any more. That means a lot of families and single people just don't have enough money to make ends meet.

"The dining room charges no fees, asks no questions, and turns no one away."

St. Anthony's, which serves breakfast and lunch six days a week, benefits from 160 volunteers -- community members with a wide spectrum of occupations and motivations: professionals, retired people, engineers, professors, and leaders of large organizations.

"No experience is needed to volunteer," says Mr. Torres, " just a willingness to accept direction."

It's lunchtime, and 200 hungry people are looking forward to a meal of hamburger with marinara sauce, rice and coleslaw.

The diners at St. Anthony's -- men, women, and children -- span all races and nationalities.

Salvador arrived here from Mexico in 1980 and has recently fallen on hard times. Lillian, an Asian woman in her mid-30s, has been a business owner in East Palo Alto.

"St. Anthony's is great for people like me, who are temporarily unemployed," she says. "If we didn't have a place like this, I wouldn't know where to get a free meal."

Frank, a veteran who works as a janitor at the VA hospital, is an outgoing man, beaming with gratitude for his 20 years clean and sober, and pride in his grown children, who are triplets.

"St. Anthony's is a great program," he says. "Sometimes it's the only meal we get."

Over the past 30 years, St. Anthony's has served approximately 3.6 million hot meals. That means more than 600 per day. In addition, 150 meals are taken to local shelters each day.

The cook, Juventino "Juve" Vargas, oversees the preparation of these meals.

The program also provides transportation for the homebound from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. In addition to the food services, free clothing is available on Wednesdays and Thursdays. One day a week, a "mini-health program" of services is available during the lunch hour.

"Financial help," says Mr. Torres, "is the most important thing for us. It gives us at St. Anthony's the flexibility to deal with our vendors. And buying in volume makes it affordable for us." INFORMATION

St. Anthony's Padua Dining Room is located at 3500 Middlefield Road near Menlo Park. Max Torres, the operations manager, can be reached at 365-9664.

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