Kameron Stambaugh
“We don’t look at someone and look at what they can’t do. We look at what they can do,”
So says Shannon Grippin, the director at the S. Wilson Pollock Center for Industrial Training (CIT) in Mechanicsburg, a program of The Arc of Cumberland & Perry Counties.
CIT works with people with disabilities, employing and training them for competitive work. For instance, trainees make boxes for Apple computer returns, connect bolt kits for industry, and prepare products for shipping.
Without question, the tastiest job at CIT is in the Sassy Gourmet kitchen.
“For the individuals, the goal is to learn skills and move on to competitive employment,” Grippin said. “For CIT and Sassy, the goal is to provide a good service to the community, while teaching individuals skills to become independent in the community.”
Sassy provides lunch for CIT employees. Roast beef, mashed potatoes and stuffing were on the menu this day. It also offers catering of sandwiches, subs, salads and nearly famous scratch-made cookies, especially the chewy oatmeal raisin.
“I put something, a little extra ingredient, into that,” said Tracy Chicoine, food service coordinator, without divulging the secret.
Trainees work in all aspects of the kitchen—prepping, hot line, cold line, grill, stocking and cleaning up. They enter the kitchen with varying degrees of skills.
“We work at their pace and try and get them up to where we need them to be, but we start with where they are and have patience with them,” Grippin said.
Chicoine described one trainee who had difficulty with fine motor skills. She said she just wasn’t sure he would be able to advance in the kitchen. In the end, though, he thrived, just needing patience beyond what a traditional kitchen setting would provide.
“He’s a really good worker, and if he’s done with something, he’ll come here and ask, ‘What else can I do?’” Chicoine said.
Sassy Gourmet not only provides lunch for its workers, but also caters parties, events and daily contracts. I like “making subs for the military,” said Jody Chestnut, a Sassy Gourmet trainee. She’s referring to the 40 or so subs the kitchen provides for the Military Entrance Processing Station in Mechanicsburg each day. Chestnut runs the slicer to prepare meats for the wraps, sandwiches and subs.
“I love it. I do,” said trainee Kameron Stambaugh. He’s often responsible for the fryer and the crispy chicken strips for Sassy’s crispy chicken salad.
The catering is one stop. Everything is provided: napkins, tablecloth, plates, plastic ware, condiments and dressings. And the food coming from Sassy’s kitchen is beautiful, delicious and plentiful.
“They [customers] don’t expect that much food,” Chicoine said.
Chadwick Dewey
Hardworking
Matt Wagner, the executive director of Family Promise of Harrisburg Capital Region, heard about Sassy through the grapevine and decided to use it for a fundraising event.
“As a nonprofit, your cost is always a driving force,” Wagner said. “I knew it was cost-effective. It was also good to know that we would help a community-based organization.”
He was surprised by the quantity of the trays of sandwiches and salads.
“The amount of food for what we paid was amazing,” he said.
Trainees take pride in what they create, especially when they can participate in the serving and receive immediate feedback.
“We had a special event two weeks ago, and they are still talking about how they liked doing it,” Grippin said.
Trainees at Sassy Gourmet are also employees, receiving payment for their time. Some go on to competitive employment in places like Weis Markets, Giant Food Stores and Cracker Barrel, while some stay on at Sassy. Stambaugh has been there for seven years.
“They’re very hardworking,” Chicoine said. “They enjoy coming to work, and they like to see people and to know that they are making money.”
A misperception exists that it may be a challenge to work with trainees because of their different abilities, but Grippin disagrees.
“It’s challenging because of transportation,” she said.
Right now, no trainees drive, so they rely on public transportation or others to get them to work. Some employees would prefer to stay for a longer day but are limited by the transportation options.
Chicoine resists any praise sent her way for working with differently abled folks.
“People say you have to be a really good person to work with someone that has a different ability,” she said. “I think that everybody can do that. I mean, it’s like working with anybody else right? We all have something.”
The “something” Sassy Gourmet trainees have is a talent and desire to create food for all to enjoy.
To order from Sassy Gourmet, visit www.cparc.org/order-sassy-gourmet.
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