ROXBURY – Roxbury restaurant owner Norvia Pena is helping prepare dozens of meals each day for the newly arrived migrants at the Melnea Cass Recreational Complex located just across the street, and it’s been a quick pivot for her. “This is America, we help everybody,” said Pena. “I’m having meetings, working on meals plans, calling vendors I work with.”
The Caribbean restaurant Fort Hill Bar and Grill is now cooking largely Haitian cuisine for the families and individuals. It’s one of several local businesses hired by the state to provide food and other necessities. She says it’s been a lifeline after the pandemic nearly shut her down.
She sympathizes with their situation arriving herself from the Dominican Republic when she was 10 years old. “They don’t know what’s going to happen to them. I feel for them, I was the same way 40 years ago,” Pena said.