Food and Friends prepares over two million meals each year for people in the D.C. region who are battling serious illnesses. The organization expects to double its impact with a $30 million addition and renovation.

The first shovels went into the ground Monday at Food and Friends’ headquarters in Northeast D.C.

The 17,000-square-foot expansion will dramatically impact how many people the organization can serve on a daily basis, the nonprofit said.

“The demand has been so high, and so we need more room. And we’re really, really excited to be kicking that off,” Food and Friends CEO Carrie Stoltzfus said. “We’re going to be able to more than double what we do.”

Food and Friends currently packages roughly 7,100 meals per day and delivers throughout the D.C. region in an area approximately the size of Connecticut.

Staff described the current building as bursting at the seams, with many rooms doubling as food storage.

“Most of the expansion space will be for food production and food storage because that’s really what drives everything else that we do and why we’re all here,” Stoltzfus said.

The new building, set to be completed in May, will include a state-of-the-art kitchen. The current kitchen will be transformed into a chilled food packing room.

The expansion also adds private nutrition counseling rooms for clients who are battling diseases such as cancer, AIDS, renal failure and other illnesses.

All clients of Food and Friends are referred to the program by healthcare providers. Dietitians and chefs have developed 11 meal types tailored to specific health needs.

Rebecca Kahn, director of nutrition services at Food and Friends, said its food is medicine, leading to better health outcomes.

“Hospital visits are going down as compared to before getting our services. Clients are saving money on healthcare costs,” she told WTOP.

Loris Adams is a volunteer and a former client who received meals from Food and Friends while she battled ovarian cancer. She’s thrilled with the expansion.

“People like me, people like your neighbors have an opportunity to be fed and nourished — body, soul and spirit — while they’re going through really hard and difficult times,” she said after the groundbreaking.

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Courtesy CNN

Courtesy CNN

Courtesy CNN

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(CNN) — At a ceremony in front of the iconic cascading fountain at Meridian Hill Park in Washington, DC, earlier this month, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and top US officials touted President Donald Trump’s efforts to make the city “safe and beautiful.”

But less than two weeks later, the historic park that served as Hegseth’s backdrop has become the latest hurdle President Donald Trump is facing in his mission to give the nation’s capital a facelift, as the water in the 13-basin fountain has turned into a murky, rust-orange hue.

The fountain had been devoid of water for seven years before the Trump administration repaired and reopened it in May in a $4 million renovation that delighted residents. After the renovation, residents flocked to the park in the evenings, sitting on the steps bordering the fountain, having picnics, and reading books.

But this week, parkgoers observed a brown color overtaking the reservoirs.

“It looks like mud,” said James Langan, a New York resident visiting DC.

The fixture at Meridian Hill Park is one of nine fountains being returned to service under Trump’s March 2025 executive order calling to make DC “safe and beautiful” coinciding with preparations for the nation’s 250th anniversary. When CNN visited the nine fountains scattered across DC this week, only one appeared to still be inoperable, and two had brown-colored water.

Some residents and visitors said they welcomed running water at Meridian Hill Park, despite the coloring.

“Whenever I’d like come here before, I was kind of disappointed that the water was never on, and it was kind of like overrun with trash,” Washington, DC, resident Jedi Sworobuk told CNN. “I think it’s nice to have, especially in the heat in the summer.”

The Interior Department told CNN on Tuesday evening that the brown water at Meridian Hill Park is “sediment as a result of the reopening of two water lines that had been out of service for some time,” noting it expected the water to run clean in the next 24 to 36 hours.

A CNN crew observed workers cleaning the cascading basins on Wednesday, following social media buzz about the browning water.

On Saturday, the pools of water were still murky, but less orange.

The Interior Department did not respond to a request for comment on Saturday on the state of the Meridian Hill fountain, and on the fountains at the General Philip Sheridan statue in Sheridan Circle, which were inactive.

The fountain at Meridian Hill Park caught the attention of Alexandra McKenna, a London resident who traveled to DC and made the park a stop on her trip.

“It looks pretty gross,” McKenna said, laughing.

McKenna pointed to the water at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, which has also generated headlines in recent weeks, adding, “It’s kind of a thing going on in Washington at the moment.”

The Meridian Hill Park scramble comes after the Reflecting Pool saga dominated conversations in Washington. After Trump called for the pool’s renovation in April, the more than $14 million project has taken on a lifecycle of draining, painting, filling and peeling.

Trump alleged vandals gashed the pool’s lining. In recent weeks, at least three people were charged with destruction of property after allegedly removing pieces of blue paint from the pool, and a former Olympian was indicted on that allegation. The canoeist, David Hearn, pleaded not guilty.

During a May Cabinet meeting, Trump said most of the fountains were in final stages or fixed.

In his recent July Fourth address on the National Mall, Trump declared the city “safe, gleaming, and beautiful again,” though some beautification projects, like the Reflecting Pool, appear to be in progress.

The National Park Service said work to restore and rehabilitate historic landscapes will occur in phases, noting that the public may experience closures or limited access at certain sites.

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The nation continues to react to the unexpected death of South Carolina Republican Senator Lindsey Graham. Graham was a veteran politician, a dealmaker and military hawk. He was also one of President Trump’s staunchest critics before his election, only to become one of Trump’s close allies on Capitol Hill after his victory.

Former Republican Senator Jeff Flake served alongside Graham from 2013-2019, and said he and Graham were “friends to the end,” despite moments of tension and disagreement. Flake weighs in on what will be Sen. Graham’s legacy. 

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Email us at considerthis@npr.org.

This episode was produced by Henry Larson, with audio engineering by Peter Ellena.
It was edited by Michael Levitt.

Our interim executive producer is Courtney Dorning.