Over 11,000 meals are served a year with no sign ups or pre-qualifications involved. The program runs Monday through Friday noon - 1:00 PM. Volunteers are always welcome to help prepare and serve the meal, and we are always grateful for food donations.

The Quincy Crisis Center is a faith-based outreach agency. Her primary mission is to serve the needs of marginalized and forgotten people while promoting social justice, biblical compassion and solidarity with the hungry, the hurting and the homeless poor. We seek, through our 24-hour hotline, emergency food services, and advocacy programs, to offer support for the whole person -- body, mind and spirit -- while maintaining human dignity in time of profound crisis and offering hope at the point of despair. We seek to be the cushion for those who slip through the "safety net" of other programs and services. Our mission compels us to go out to meet the hungry, homeless, and hurting where they are; providing free hot meals, emergency grocery delivery and crisis counseling. Our mission also compels us to bring others with us, advancing a culture of compassion that recognizes that the needs of others are, in fact, my need and your need.

Quincy Crisis Center (QCC) began in 1978 when Esther Sanger started a crisis hotline and later began serving meals to the homeless and poor from her van on the streets of Quincy. She began by posting her phone number around Quincy, on telephone polls, in laundromats, etc. with a simple message, "Need Help? Call Esther" and by going out into the community to meet the homeless. Over the past 20 years, her ministry has grown from a one woman effort into the present organization, now named in her memory, the "Esther R. Sanger Center for Compassion." The Sanger Center is the umbrella organization for two of Esther's efforts to meet the needs of the marginalized. Quincy Crisis Center is one program partner. The Sanger Center's other program partner is the Mary-Martha Learning Center, an emergency shelter, providing an education program, food and shelter to homeless women with children. The Mary-Martha Learning Center is located in Hingham.

Quincy Crisis Center is a part of the Esther R. Sanger Center for Compassion, (ERSCC) and is governed by the ERSCC Board of Directors. Quincy Crisis Center (QCC) and the Mary Martha Learning Center (MMLC) Program Directors answer to the Executive Coordinator of the ERSCC who is appointed by the Board.

Quincy Crisis Center (QCC) serves hungry people and people in need without red tape, questions or verification of need. If someone expresses a need for food, we meet that need through referral, food delivery or the hot meal program. We believe that a perceived need is a need and that a person's dignity should be respected to the extent that they should not have to defend their request for help. Because QCC focuses on meeting the needs of the whole person -- body, mind and spirit -- our staff and volunteers work on developing relationships with the people who request assistance. In this relationship, we often meter our response when needed to encourage personal responsibility and independence. Basically this means that some families may be limited to one food delivery per month. No one is turned away from the Hot Meal program, except for disciplinary problems.