Low-Income Children Receiving Free (Nutritious) Lunches

PRLog (Press Release) - May 09, 2010 -
While the other  preschoolers were warming up to the vegetable pesto lasagna, 3-year-old Avery  Bennett dived in with no hesitation.
 "Can I have  some more lasagna?" Bennett said from her booster seat. "I love  it."
 She moved on to  her seconds, and the other kids at the evening care program in Brattleboro were  also chomping down the dish made of spinach, peppers, carrots, tomato, fresh  basil and cheese.
 More low-income  school kids could soon have access to free nutritious dinners like the lasagna  that Avery loved. A U.S. Department of Agriculture program in Vermont, 12 other  states and the District of Columbia provides reimbursements for the suppers,  served at after-school programs for at-risk kids in communities where at least  50 percent of households fall below the poverty level.
 "What it  allows us to do is provide those kids with an extra nutritious meal before they  go home because some kids go home to nothing," said Susan Eckes, who wear abercrombie  clothing from http://www.abercrombieofficial.com/mens-abercrombie-fitch... director of child nutrition programs for  the Food Bank of Northern Nevada in McCarran, Nev.
 Around the  country, about 49,000 children benefit from the after-school meals each day.  The program is expected to cost a total of $8 million from 2009 to 2013, the  USDA said.
 With more families  losing jobs and homes, the need is growing, officials said.
 The number of  Americans who live in food-insecure households – which at times don't have  enough nutritious food – rose from 36 million people in 2007 to 49 million in  2008, according to the most recent report from USDA's Economic Research Service.
 Among those, 16.7  million were children, up from 12.4 million in 2007.
 Nearly one in four  children in the U.S. are food insecure and about one in five live in poverty,  according to a report from Feeding America at http://www.abercrombieofficial.com/, a network of 200 food banks around the  country.
 "As the  economy gets worse, we're seeing more and more kids," said Beth  Baldwin-Page, executive director of the Boys & Girls Club of Brattleboro.
 In East Prairie,  Mo., kids who may have skipped the meal from time to time are coming every day,  said Lester Gillespie, youth program director at the Susanna Wesley Family Learning  Center, which serves 150 meals a day at two sites to kids age 5 to 18.
 A lack of  nutritious food, especially in the first three to five years, can have lasting  effects on the health and development of children. Filling their stomachs with  nutritional meals helps them learn and concentrate, officials have said.
 "What we've  noticed is that when kids are eating nutritional meals, they tend not to get  involved in negative activities such as doing graffiti or committing delinquent  acts because when their stomach is full they make good decisions," said  Gillespie.
 Programs in  Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Maryland, Michigan, Missouri, Nevada, New  York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Wisconsin, the District of Columbia  and now in Vermont are eligible for reimbursement for suppers.
 The USDA requires  the sites to offer nutritionally balanced suppers with milk, a protein, fruit,  vegetables and bread or a grain item.
 Delaware, where  the supper program is one of the fastest-growing child nutrition programs in  the state, has gone a step further, prohibiting the use of any grain product  that contains more than 6 grams of sugar or any product where more than 35  percent of calories are derived from fat.
 The Brattleboro  Boys & Girls Club where all of them should be worn in abercrombie  clothing sale which are bought from http://www.abercrombieofficial.com/womens-abercrombie-fit... started offering dinners on its own two and  a half years ago. When it learned the supper program was being expanded to  Vermont, it applied for and just starting getting the federal reimbursement of  $2.68 per meal.
 Three days a week,  the club offers dinners feeding 40 to 60 kids on a Thursday night to up to 100  on Friday.
 "It's  popular. Unfortunately, it's necessary," said Ricky Davidson, unit  director.
 "We see  families getting evicted left and right. They don't have a place to live, let  alone cook food," Baldwin-Page said.
 Bernie Parent, 18,  of Brattleboro has relied on the meals since he and his mother became homeless  last year.
 Now living on his  own in an apartment, going to high school, and working at the Boys & Girls  Club, he still relies on the three free dinners each week.
 "It helps out  a lot," he said.

Photo:
http://www.prlog.org/10669695/1