The Goodwin Senior Center in Wellman offered a brunch on Labor Day, which was their first fundraiser in over 18 months due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Anne Mann, president of the senior commission, said the funds from the Labor Day brunch help defray daily operation costs throughout the year.

The senior dining center filled up and emptied multiple times during the brunch, which ran from 8-11 a.m., in addition to the drive thru option, which served dozens of customers who wanted to pick up a quick meal.

“Dine in and drive thru, we’ve done phenomenal at both ends,” Mann said. “There have been people from different communities, too, like North English, Washington and Kalona that I’ve seen eating in here today, so they’re coming from all over.”

Leroy Powell, who has been serving on the senior commission for over 15 years, including several years as president, was wandering through the dining room, refilling coffees and chatting with diners. He is retiring from the commission, with the Labor Day brunch being his last event.

“We moved here in 2006,” Powell said, explaining that when he and his wife, Marilyn, retired they wanted to move closer to one of their children. “We came here and this town has been wonderful to us. We used to come over for our grandkids’ football and basketball games and wrestling meets and people always treated us like we were from here.”

While the senior dining program has been operating since the 1980s, it has only been in its current location on 8th Ave since 2008.

“This place, at that time, at the summer of ’06, it was a big ol’ department store, and the birds were flying in and out of the roof and it was a mess,” Powell said. “Then, someone came to the Rotary meeting with plans for what to do here and the city bought in on it. In the spring of 2008, [the dining program] moved from City Hall down to this building. It’s been a wonderful thing.”

The senior dining program is important, Mann said, because it gives the seniors a balanced meal as well as a chance to socialize.

“For seniors, the cooking and the grocery shopping can be overwhelming for some,” Mann said. “We try to make things they might not be able to make at home, like a lasagna, or we’ll offer watermelon for fresh fruit so the seniors don’t have to go out and buy a whole watermelon.”

While the pandemic did shut the doors to the Goodwin Senior Center for a while, the staff worked hard to still provide meals, including delivering meals throughout the community. She said she expects the center to “ramp up again” this winter with providing and delivering meals during he cold months.

“We just take it day by day and week by week and month by month,” Mann said. “We know things can change for us, so we just try to adapt to whatever change there is.”

Both Mann and Powell said the Labor Day brunch was a huge success, noting that “a whole new generation” was helping in the kitchen, giving the senior center a new crop of volunteers.

“We feel very fortunate to have this open in Wellman. It’s like anything else, it goes through its highs and its lows, but the fundraisers have always been well attended. This is so nice to see,” Mann said, gesturing to the dining room full of people enjoying a good meal.