Preparing meals for Everyone Eats Vermont Everyone Eats! has served more than 1,024,000 meals to residents impacted by COVID-19. The program helped save an estimated 500 restaurant jobs and provided consistent business to some 200 eateries when that industry was dealt a severe pandemic blow. The meals from chicken-and-leek pie with salad to chicken sausage with couscous and green beans even include local ingredients. Yet before the state legislature established the program in August 2020 with $5 million in CARES Act relief funds, a grassroots movement sprang up across the state to feed people in need. These early efforts swift business pivots that involved a collaboration of restaurants and nonprofits included ShiftMeals in Burlington, organized by the Skinny Pancake; a partnership in Vergennes among the city s Boys & Girls Club, Bar Antidote and Three Squares Café; and a southern Vermont initiative, Nourishing Artists, co
workforce shortage JENNIFER SHAFER-STOCKER, co-owner of Shafer’s Market & Deli in Middlebury, works the counter at the College Street business earlier this week. She and family members are having to work longer hours while cutting store hours because they like many other businesses in the county and statewide can’t find enough employees.
Independent photo/William Haig 04/29/2021 MIDDLEBURY Only 14 months ago, Shafer’s Market & Deli at 54 College St. in Middlebury was a no-fail stop pretty much any time of the morning or evening if you needed a sandwich, gallon of milk, soda, pizza and other indulgences.
Shafer’s still has the tasty products and household staples, but you have to time your visits more carefully these days. The business has had to temporarily abandon its customary 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. days for a tighter schedule that ends at 7 p.m., at the latest.
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