Expand<\/a><\/p>\nFarmer babysits the children during the summer and was relieved to learn the meals would remain available this year.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a big help when they\u2019re out of school,\u201d she said. \u201cOne thing we don\u2019t have to worry about is lunch. Especially with the prices and stuff, I\u2019m surprised this is something that\u2019s still going. I was wondering if it was going to be cut. Everything is going high, bread, and just everything in general. It\u2019s a very good help.\u201d<\/p>\n
The U.S Department of Agriculture operates a Summer Meals Program \u2014 administered in Pennsylvania by the Department of Education \u2014 which allows nonprofit organizations to receive reimbursable meals to serve children at different sites, state officials said. Last summer, more than 5.6 million meals were served at 2,110 summer meal sites throughout Pennsylvania as part of the program.<\/p>\n
Farmer, who ran a summer camp for children at Salvation Apostolic Temple on North Main Avenue in the city from June 22-26, said she secured free meals through the program to make the task sustainable.<\/p>\n
There were 94 participants last month, up from 64 last year, she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThose meals became mighty helpful,\u201d Farmer said.<\/p>\n
The Scranton School District feeds nearly 1,000 students per day during the peak of its Summer Feeding Program, said Precious Gilliard, general manager of Aramark Food Service for the district. The free meals are available to all children 18 and under through Aug. 14.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen we started rolling out some breakfast opportunities June 15, and lunch for all the open sites, we went from serving 300 meals a day to now upwards of 800 meals per day,\u201d Gilliard said. \u201cWe\u2019re seeing an absolute increase in the take rate when it comes to summer meals in our district and in the community. We\u2019re seeing those numbers going up every single week \u2026 the need is absolutely out there.\u201d<\/p>\n
Each meal includes an entree, fruit, vegetable, and milk, water or juice, she said.<\/p>\n
Patrick Laffey, assistant to the superintendent for finance and operations at the Scranton School District, said the free summer meals ensure kids have access to healthy food all year.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is so much development going on in those ages,\u201d he said. \u201cProper nutrition and proper meals are so important for their growth, their development and anything related to learning. Throughout the school year, we even see sometimes on a Monday morning, students are coming in and they\u2019re looking for a healthy, nutritious breakfast. They may not have had that opportunity over the weekend. With the extended summer break, it\u2019s so important they have the ability to access a nutritious breakfast or lunch. The open sites are scattered throughout the city so there is pretty good access for people to have this opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n
Joah Rittenhouse, youth services librarian for the Pottsville Free Public Library, noted demand has also remained fairly high for children securing free meals provided by the Pottsville Area School District, Monday through Friday at the library until July 30.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s a couple consistent ones that we see every single day,\u201d he said. \u201cThe fact that it ends at the end of July, there are a lot of people that it already feels like they\u2019re panicking.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rittenhouse added teenagers often stop in later in the afternoon to snag a grab-and-go meal and appreciate the fact that they\u2019re available.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe partner with the school on a lot of things, so it was kind of a gimme,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019re always here so it just works out well.\u201d<\/p>\n
Families may register for meals by emailing\u00a0potchild@pottsvillelibrary.org with the name and age of each child, and what day and time they will be attending.<\/p>\n
The Hazleton Area School District\u2019s Seamless Summer Food Service Program provides free, nutritious lunches to all children 18 and under from Monday through Thursday through Aug. 6 at most sites, said Mitchell Milbrand, lead director of food and nutrition for the Nutrition Group at the Hazleton Area School District\n<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is definitely still a need,\u201d Milbrand said. \u201cWe serve quite a bit of meals at numerous sites. A lot of these students rely on meals all year at the school\u00a0 \u2014 a free breakfast or free lunch. With the summer program, they can go out to a park, or Maple Manor, and get a hot meal. I think it\u2019s very important.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Greater Wyoming Valley Area YMCA serves about 12,000 meals each summer through its Food & Fun at the Park program, said Lennae Pellam, director of the program. In addition to four parks in Wilkes-Barre, one in Duryea and one in Luzerne \u2014 through Aug. 21 \u2014 the YCMA also provides noncongregate meals at the White Haven Area Community Library and Newport Twp. Little League Field, she added.<\/p>\n
Noncongregate meals are food distributions that are consumed off-site rather than eaten together in a supervised location.<\/p>\n
\u201cDemand had definitely increased,\u201d Pellam said. \u201cWith the noncongregate meals, we\u2019re distributing five lunches and five breakfasts to each family every week. We\u2019re serving 2,000 meals every Monday night, and that\u2019s not including what we serve daily out of the parks.\u201d<\/p>\n
FREE MEAL SITES\/TIMES THROUGHOUT NEPA<\/p>\n
SCRANTON<\/p>\n
\u2022Connell Pool, 800 Gibbons St., Monday-Friday, noon-1:45 p.m.<\/p>\n
\u2022Fellows Park, 1000 Fellows St., Monday-Friday, noon-1:45 p.m.<\/p>\n
\u2022McDade Pool, 1 Bald Mountain Road, Monday-Friday, noon-1:45 p.m.<\/p>\n
\u2022Novembrino Splash Pad, South 10th Avenue & Washburn Street, Monday-Friday, noon-1:45 p.m.<\/p>\n
\u2022Weston Field Pool\/Park, 982 Providence Road, Monday-Friday, noon-1:45 p.m.<\/p>\n
\u2022Weston Park\/Pool, 100 Spring St., Monday-Friday, noon-1:45 p.m.<\/p>\n
\u2022Valley View Terrace, 950 Pear St., Wednesdays and Fridays, 10 a.m.-noon.<\/p>\n
WILKES-BARRE (all sites 11:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m.)<\/p>\n
\u2022McGlynn Learning Center at Mineral Springs Village, 233 Eastview Drive<\/p>\n
\u2022McGlynn Learning Center at Boulevard Townhomes, 68 Midland Court<\/p>\n
\u2022Weissman Playground, 15 Mundy St.<\/p>\n
\u2022Coal Street Park, 38 Coal St.<\/p>\n
DURYEA (11:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m.)<\/p>\n
\u2022Healey Park, 398 Foote Ave.<\/p>\n
LUZERNE (11:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m.)<\/p>\n
\u2022Louis Falcone Park, 468 Charles St.<\/p>\n
GREATER HAZLETON (Monday-Thursday)<\/p>\n
\u20228 a.m.-9:30 a.m. (breakfast) and 11:15 a.m.-noon (lunch), through Aug. 6.<\/p>\n
Maple Manor, 1700 W. 22nd St., Hazle Twp.<\/p>\n
\u20228-9 a.m. (breakfast) and 11:30 a.m.-noon (lunch), through Aug. 6.<\/p>\n
Hazleton Art League, 31 W. Broad St., Hazleton<\/p>\n
\u202211 a.m.-12:30 p.m. (breakfast), through Aug. 6<\/p>\n
Cyber Academy at Laurel Mall, 106 Laurel Mall Road, Hazleton<\/p>\n
\u202210-10:40 a.m. (lunch), through July 31<\/p>\n
Whispering Willow Park, 334 S. Main St., Conyngham<\/p>\n
\u202210:45-11:30 a.m. (lunch), through Aug. 6<\/p>\n
Freeland Village, 61 Evancho Circle, Freeland<\/p>\n
Beech Street Park, 200 block of Beech Street, Hazleton<\/p>\n
James Street Playground, 700 block of James Street, Hazleton<\/p>\n
\u202211 a.m.-noon (lunch), through July 31<\/p>\n
Butler Twp. Recreation Center, 411 W. Butler Drive, Drums<\/p>\n
\u202211:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. (lunch), through Aug. 6<\/p>\n
Nuremburg Town Park, 185 Mahanoy St., Nuremburg<\/p>\n
\u202211:45 a.m.-12:30 p.m. (lunch), through Aug. 6<\/p>\n
Freeland Park, 600 Front St., Freeland<\/p>\n
East End Park and Playground, 100 block of Mill Street, Hazleton<\/p>\n
Hazleton Garden Apartments, 901 Hazleton Apts., Hazle Twp.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As food insecurity surges throughout the region, driven by rising grocery costs, Scranton resident Tiffany Farmer stressed that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":247857,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[201,182,803,139,28,178,180,179,181],"class_list":["post-247856","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-scranton","tag-lackawanna-county","tag-local-news","tag-luzerne-county","tag-news","tag-pennsylvania","tag-scranton","tag-scranton-headlines","tag-scranton-news","tag-top-stories-stt"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247856","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=247856"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247856\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/247857"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=247856"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=247856"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=247856"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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