St. Vincent de Paul’s Dining Hall is a godsend, where homeless people can get a hearty lunch and dinner seven days a week — but it runs on volunteers who seem to be evaporating with the troubling news from Salt Lake City’s Rio Grande district.
Reports of violence leading up to Operation Rio Grande — a law enforcement sweep targeting drug dealers and addicts — are frightening volunteers away, said Danielle Stamos, spokeswoman for Catholic Community Services of Utah (CCS), which runs the dining hall.