Schools, local organizations to provide meals during summer
May 30—Morgan County Schools, which is having a food give-away Saturday, is one of several entities providing food assistance to people in the county during the summer when students are home.
Beginning at 9 a.m. at Brewer High School, 59 Eva Road in Somerville, and continuing until the food is gone, volunteers will distribute a truck full of food in Wipe Out Hunger Day. No registration is required.
"We plan to feed over 300 families, and we will have over 100 volunteers there to help," said Superintendent Tracie Turrentine. "It is one of my favorite days for my own kids and I to serve others."
Morgan County Schools also provides free breakfast to students enrolled in its June summer school program. While 59% of Morgan County Schools students — about 4,500 of them — receive free and reduced lunches during the school year, fewer than 500 receive meals through the school during the summer.
From Monday to June 26, Decatur City Schools will offer free breakfast and lunch to any Morgan County child 18 years old or younger at 12 of its schools: Austin High, Austin Middle, Career Academies of Decatur, Eastwood Elementary, Austinville Elementary, Banks-Caddell Elementary, Woodmeade Elementary, Oak Park Elementary, Frances Nungester Elementary, Julian Harris Elementary, Benjamin Davis Elementary, and Chesnut Grove Elementary.
Jenny Newton, DCS child nutrition program supervisor, said the children don't need to be enrolled in DCS to receive a meal. A parent or other family member can't pick up a meal for a child, though; the child must be present on the school grounds to receive the food.
DCS will be going into its second year as a Community Eligibility Provision location — a program that helps schools in low-income areas to provide breakfast and lunch to all students free of charge.
"Nutrition is very important to students in the learning process," Newton said. "It is very hard to pay attention when you're hungry, ... so I feel like that's one of the most important things we can do for a student is make sure that they are well fed when they go in the classroom, so they can put their full focus on learning."
Newton said 75% of DCS families qualify for free or reduced cost lunches.
Newton said most of those fed at the DCS locations during the summer are students who participate in summer school or are already on a campus.
About 30 million students nationwide are enrolled in the U.S. Department of Agriculture's school breakfast and lunch program, but only one in six of these children receive meals through participating locations during the summer, according to the USDA.
In a year-round mission, Decatur Neighborhood Christian Center will continue to provide food and clothing on Mondays and Wednesdays from 9 to 11 a.m.
"With the kids home for the summer, there will be more mouths to feed for families because of them not being in school and getting the school lunches," said Pamela Bolding, executive director of NCC, "so we'll see more people this summer who need food."
Ashley Boyd, executive director of the Committee on Church Cooperation, said the number of people using their food pantry services keeps increasing.
"Volunteers are always welcome and always needed. ... I know everyone is so tired of hearing about the economy, but there are more people utilizing us than ever before," Boyd said. "It continues to rise."
CCC estimates there were more than 12,000 pantry visits this past year. CCC takes the specific needs of the families it serves into consideration.
"We do try to tailor our food pantry especially for parents with school-aged children who may be struggling with affording child care, making sure they have the foods they need and foods that the kids themselves can prepare if need be," Boyd said.
Many other families rely on summer camps and youth programming as a source of meals. This year, Decatur Youth Services will partner with DCS to provide the children participating in Camp Safe Haven with warm meals for breakfast and lunch. In previous years, the meals were not warm.
"We're a low-income camp, so being able to have somewhere that provides breakfast and lunch that's hot and not cold for the kids is a blessing," said Johnny Jones, the DYS summer program coordinator. "A lot of those kids don't really get those meals very often."
The camp, which begins Tuesday, will serve about 115 students this summer. Jones said providing these meals lets campers know someone cares about them.
"That's something we're very happy to be a part of and happy to feed those kids any way we can," Newton said.
The USDA automatically enrolls families who receive help from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, or other income-based meal benefits in a program called SUN Bucks. During the summer, these families can receive $120 per eligible student to use toward grocery expenses.
People can also visit feedingalabama.org/need-help to locate food banks near them and seek help applying for SNAP benefits. Morgan County has 15 food banks listed on the Feeding Alabama website.
— GraciAnn.Goodin@DecaturDaily.com or 256-340-2437
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