Participants at this Saturday’s Chautauqua Lake Dragon Boat Festival in Celoron will have an opportunity to enjoy breakfast while helping provide home-delivered meals to hundreds of local senior citizens served by Jamestown Meals on Wheels.

For the sixth time, Jamestown Meals on Wheels will be partnering with the Chautauqua Lake Dragon Boat Festival. The festival is a fun-for-all-ages community event that aims to bring awareness and raise money to support Chautauqua Lake.

Jamestown Meals on Wheels will have breakfast available from 7:30 to 10:30 a.m. in the Celoron Park pavilion. Pancakes, sausage, home fries and more will be available at a price of $8 per adult, or $5 for a child under age 12. Beverage and pastry will be available for $3. Coffee or bottled water will be available for $1.

Local businesses have donated goods to be provided at the breakfast.

“This breakfast is now our largest fundraising event,” said Barrie Yochim, Meals on Wheels executive director. “We are thrilled that we will be back for a sixth year, because the previous five events have gone so well.”

The all-day event itself consists of dragon boat racing where teams each race multiple times to advance to the afternoon race finals. Dragon boats originated in China more than 2,000 years ago, and dragon boat racing is currently the fastest growing sport in the world.

Money raised from the Meals on Wheels breakfast goes to help pay for meal delivery to senior citizens in southern and central Chautauqua County who cannot pay for their meals, or who can pay only a small amount. That helps keep our area’s seniors at home, where they can remain safe, happy and healthy, Yochim said.

He thanks all the organizers of the dragon boat event for including Meals on Wheels again this year, he said. The Chautauqua Lake Association and Village of Celoron have been important in linking Meals on Wheels with the dragon boat festival.

Jamestown Meals on Wheels relies on fundraising events like the pancake breakfast to raise money to get meals into the hands of area senior citizens. Meals on Wheels also receives funding from Chautauqua County Office For Aging Services, as well as other individual contributors. Meals on Wheels is a United Way Community Partner.

Meals on Wheels of the Jamestown Area provides heatable and cold home-delivered meals five days a week in two-thirds of Chautauqua County. The organization can also provide ready-to-heat frozen meals for use on weekends.

UPMC Chautauqua prepares meals for Meals on Wheels recipients in southern Chautauqua County from the hospital’s Jones Memorial Health Center kitchen.

Meals are delivered by a combination of paid drivers and volunteers from the community. Some Meals on Wheels volunteers are from the Retired and Senior Volunteer Program.

Meals on Wheels always has volunteer delivery slots available, where volunteers from the community can help deliver essential meals to needy seniors. For more information about Meals on Wheels, call 488-9119.