With gasoline prices threatening to breach the $4 a gallon mark, a charity that depends on its wheels is feeling the crunch.

Tama Shaw, executive director of Hill Country Community Action, said gas prices will affect the organization’s budget next budget year, but it also is hurting their drive for volunteers who deliver meals locally.

Hill Country is a non-profit organization in San Saba that administers the Meals on Wheels food program in Temple, Belton and Killeen in Bell County, and areas in eight other counties.

“We’ve heard employees and staff members discuss that it’s getting harder to get volunteers,” she said. “Some volunteers say it is hard to afford to do as much, or at all, but we’re still hanging in there.”

The organization served 24,352 home-delivered meals in Temple, 12,748 in Belton and 15,417 in Killeen in the first six months of its fiscal year starting last October.

It has had a freeze in place on increasing meals in the program since January after two years of delivering too many meals for its budget.

Ms. Shaw said the ongoing freeze is indirectly connected to gas prices, in addition to an anticipated raise in minimum wages. All of these elements will affect the organization’s upcoming budget, she said.

But for some of those not on the Hill Country payroll, the desire to help sometimes overcomes the hardship of paying for their own gas.

Marie Martch of Belton has volunteered for the program for the past four years. She said she does not intend to let the price of gas keep her from making her deliveries.

“I do this every week,” she said.

“I do it as a community service project - giving a little back to my community and helping the shut-ins,” she said, adding she travels between 20 and 25 miles each time she works.

For her, the help she delivers in the form of food and welcome conversation has greater value than what she spends on gas.

“I have friendships with two ladies who I’ve delivered to for all four years,” she said. “I’ve never looked at cost. That really is insignificant if you look at what you are doing for those people.”

She said the price of gas, although high, is basically the same cost as two Cokes or two bottles of water.

“It’s a hardship, but I’m overlooking it,” she said.

“Most of my clients don’t have any family,” she said, explaining why it is important for her to continue working.

She said one man she delivers meals to has lived in the same apartment for 11 years without any family to care for him.

“The only person he ever saw was me and the other people who deliver to him,” she said.

Ann Thompson, executive director of United Way of Central Texas, said volunteers are what make the meals program work.

“We’re keeping an eye on it because the program is so important to us,” she said. “It’s not just the meal delivered, to those people it may be the only people they see all day long or all week long.”

She said that although United Way has increased funding to the program, those increases are not sustaining the program against the price of gas.

“Anybody who wants to volunteer, or if they want to donate money for gas, they can do it through United Way,” she said.

She said gas prices and the cost for volunteers is an ongoing concern for the United Way.

“I drove by the pump today and supreme gas was $4.10, and my first thought was how are we going to keep meals being delivered,” she said.

Ms. Shaw said the good news is a change in the meals program made several years ago seems to have reduced the cost of driving.

Currently, the program cooks meals in 13 locations in its nine-county coverage area. Formerly, the organization cooked from two central kitchens - one in Belton and one in San Saba.

“Working from two central kitchens, we spent a lot of money on vans, cost of vehicle maintenance and fuel,” she said. “We did a projection of cooking on site at each center and it seemed to be more cost effective.”

Temple has a kitchen at 15 North Second for delivered meals. Many of its meals are delivered to residents of the Temple Housing Authority high rise facilities.

Sammons Community Center prepares meals to be eaten on site as part of the program. Belton cooks its meals and delivers them from the Belton Senior Center, Ms. Shaw said.

Hill Country Community Action gets funding for its meals program in part from Central Texas Council of Governments, Area Agency on Aging, Department of Aging and Disability Services, United Way, Temple, Belton, Killeen and Bell County.

This year, Hill Country has a budget of $1,237,965.