GALENA, Ohio — Ellen Milligan delivers more than just hot meals to the people on her lunch route in eastern Delaware County. They listen for her car pulling up the drive before greeting her at the door as they would a friend. Some usher her inside, eager for company. Milligan stops to chat, if only for a few minutes, knowing she might be their only visitor that day. "When you do little things for them, they’re so appreciative," she said. "It just makes me feel so good inside." Milligan, 55, works part-time driving special-needs children to school but volunteers twice a week for the county Senior Nutrition Program between her morning and afternoon shifts.

Program organizers want to recruit more volunteers like her to help fill a shortage on nine of the 25 daily meal routes.

The program, funded by the Council for Older Adults of Delaware County and the United Way, has grown by 27 percent since 2001. Roughly 180 volunteers deliver about 13,000 meals a month to clients, most of whom are older than 60.

Retirees are the backbone of the program, but many travel south for the winter, creating an urgent need for replacements, said Linda Lowe, who manages the program.

"It really kind of started back in the fall, when the snowbirds began to leave for Florida," she said. Illnesses and the death of some long-time volunteers compounded the problem.

For now, paid drivers are helping to fill the void, Lowe said.

Winter months are tough on volunteer-driven programs across the state, said Barbara Sykes, president and chief executive of the Ohio United Way.

"Just the mere fact that some of the volunteers are older and, in some cases, it’s not safe for them to come out," Sykes said. "We have to start looking at putting emphasis on always trying to keep our core volunteers, but to start looking at different ways of getting another group, a younger group, to start volunteering."

That can be an elusive demographic, said Pat Miley, program director at Connections Volunteer Center in Delaware.

"It’s very difficult to find someone who’s younger who has time during the middle of the day," Miley said.

Lowe is reaching out to the area’s stay-at-home moms and dads, home-school parents and those who work unconventional hours.

Heather Lane, of Ashley, has incorporated volunteering for the program once a week into her sons’ home-schooling curriculum.

"Mainly, I just wanted to teach them that it’s not that hard to be the people who go out and do things," she said. "We have really, really enjoyed it. We probably get more out of it than the people that we’re serving."

Grace and Dick Beaver usually watch out the window of their Galena home for their lunch to arrive. They both welcomed Milligan at the door yesterday and invited her in, as they do every Wednesday.

Mrs. Beaver, 80, said her arthritis makes it difficult for her to prepare food for herself and her husband, who has Parkinson’s disease.

He usually spends much of the day asleep, but the meals — and daily visitors — perk him up, she said.

"It’s really a blessing."

dwilson@dispatch.com