The Next Chapter.....
As the Covid Pandemic passes and life begins to resemble the pre-covid days, it is time for us to go back to our grassroots, our family, and focus on a new mission at hand.
Our drive, passion, and commitment to the military still burns strong to this day. Recently it was brought to our attention that our Active Military Families are living on a poverty-level income and depend on government assistance programs like food stamps and WIC programs. This was even prior to the covid pandemic. However, prior to the pandemic many spouses were able to supplement their household incomes with a career of their own. Since the pandemic families and spouses have been under strict covid guidelines on the bases. Anyone conducting business off the base needed to quarantine therefore causing the spouses to leave their positions eliminating a second income.
This call to action led me to the one person we knew could help! Chef Mike Jurusz of Chef Mike’s ABG in South Seaside Park. Like Mike did 10 years ago after Hurricane Sandy, when we created “if there is a need we will feed” as a thank you meal for all our first responders and military who were here helping us restore, he was ready to help once again! We began brainstorming for a day on a solution for our new mission of helping our Active Military Families!
24 hours later and we had a program ready to launch!
With our restaurant families fully behind us, we started collecting Gift Cards to support our Active Military Families with participating restaurants ready to offer a match. Purchase a gift card from one of the participating restaurants to be left as a donation for our active military families. Dine on Us personnel will stop at each restaurant to pick up those gift cards. When they do, the restaurant will donate a matching gift card of the same value.
Dine on Us will sort the gift cards into packages of five. Our mission is to give the 125 active military families living on our Joint Bases in NJ a long overdue night out with their family, a much-needed date night with their spouse, groceries, and a tank of gas. This is our way of saying: “From our table to yours, Dine on Us!” Thank you for your service. We have their families back, while they are protecting ours”.
Sincerely,
Cliff Baker, Founder, Dine on Us
"from our table to yours"
dineonus.org
732-814-2064