Sonoma County kids summer lunch program jumps 22 percent

<p>Redwood Empire Food Bank served more than 92,000 meals to children during a 10-week summer meals program, a jump of 22 percent compared to 2009.</p><p>The increase marks both greater need driven by the recession as well as expanded efforts by the food bank to feed children while school is out, said David Goodman, the food bank's executive director.</p><p>“We saw this enormous gap in what happens for children when the school bell rings,” Goodman said. “Some kids go to Acapulco and Tahoe and other kids go hungry.”</p><p>The program targets some of the 26,000 low-income students in Sonoma County who rely on free and reduced-price school meals during the school year.</p><p>School districts have had to slash summer school programs, focusing the reduced effort on high school students who need help advancing grades.</p><p>In response, the food bank opened meal programs in places within walking distance of low-income communities, Goodman said.</p><p>“The detriments of malnutrition and anemia will stay with them for the rest of their lives,” he said.</p><p>Five years ago, the food bank served about 4,000 meals, mostly lunches, to children in its summer program. That number jumped to about 54,000 in 2008 and to 75,000 in 2009, Goodman said.</p><p>From June 7 to Aug. 13 this year, volunteers served lunches to school-age children at 41 sites in the county, including 19 in Santa Rosa. The effort was financed with U.S. Department of Agriculture funds allocated through California's Department of Education, Goodman said.</p><p>Volunteers ran healthy eating and gardening activities at many of the sites, said Gail Atkins, the food bank's programs director. Children revived a garden at Petaluma's McDowell Elementary School and cleared weeds from a neglected site at Apple Valley Apartments in Santa Rosa's Coddingtown neighborhood, she said.</p><p>“We just used any kind of patch of space we could, depending on whether there was land, and if not we did container gardens,” Atkins said.</p><p>The children took home the produce they harvested.</p><p>Santa Rosa City School's main kitchen provided most of the food along with Healdsburg Unified School District's central kitchen.</p><p>“We served more fresh fruits and vegetables then ever before,” said Cathy Luellen-Aflague, director of child nutrition for Santa Rosa City Schools. “We even had salad bars at some food sites.”</p><p>School officials won't know until October if more students qualify for free or reduced-price lunches this year, Luellen-Aflague said.</p><p>Any child who qualified last year can start out the year with the school-provided lunches, Luellen-Aflague said. Applications are still being accepted, she said.</p>