Skip the window and come inside: Saint John soup kitchen reopens dining room

Romero House in Saint John has served nearly 477,000 meals since COVID-19 began — all out of a takeout window.

Evelyn McNulty, the executive director of the non-profit soup kitchen, says on average, the soup kitchen serves 450 meals per day.

"I've been here myself working for 30 years now and I've never seen it like this," she said.

"There are so many people who come to our window, that self-report that they are living outside, living in cars, living, you know, in horrible circumstances."

Romero House has operated near uptown Saint John for over 40 years.

The dining room used to act as a place for staff and volunteers to get to know those using the soup kitchen. At one point, McNulty said they knew every single person that came in.

"Out the window, it's a whole different story. You see somebody for two minutes and then they're gone."

But McNulty said the kitchen has to be more in touch with the people it serves, so the dining room has reopened under a hybrid model. Clients can come in or use the window, based on their comfort level. 

On the first day indoor dining was open, McNulty said things were a little slow and a lot of people still chose to use the window, but that changed by the second day.

She said one of the positives of the takeout window was that it allowed some who might have never considered going to a soup kitchen to use the service without feeling any sort of embarrassment. 

But one of the more difficult parts of operating only a takeout was the use of containers. She said using hundreds of compostable containers every day wasn't financially feasible.

Reopening the dining room while accounting for increased demand is going to pose its own set of challenges.

"To serve 500 meals in a 60-seat place, in that amount of time, is a challenge. People, when they don't have a place to go, are going to want to hang around, they're going to want to sit and be comfortable for a while in an actual chair."

But with the hybrid model, if someone can't find a seat, the window will still be there, she said.