Nutrition needs

By: NICKOLAS FONTENOT
Staff Reporter

Just as a child’s education does not end when school lets out for extended periods of time, neither does a child’s physical need for proper nutrition.
The Summer Food Service Program (SFSP) provides lunch for these children, free of charge during the summer months when they are out of school. This year’s program is housed at the Ville Platte High School Cafeteria.
“This program provides nutritious meals and snacks that help sustain children from low-income neighborhoods while they do not have access to properly balanced meal choices such as those provided by the school,” said City of Ville Platte Feeding Program Administrator Annie Chapman Bradley.
According to Bradley, there were 359 children under the age of 18 who came to eat a hearty and nutritious meal at the SFSP site.
As a general rule set forth by the USDA, there is only one qualification that individuals must meet before they eat their totally free lunch; they must be under 18 years of age. Other than age, students are never asked any other qualifying questions to receive a meal.
The Summer Food Service Program is fully funded on the Federal level. In most cases, according to Bradley, the SFSP is administered on the state level and even at the local level in some cases. Local volunteers do whatever it takes to find a location (or site) and volunteers to prepare and serve the food for the children in attendance.
According to a spokesman for the USDA, when a site is designated to be ran locally, fully licensed and qualified people are asked (not paid) to make sure the food is fully prepared and served in a timely manner.
Based on population and average income, it’s at the states discretion to decide whether to consider the mean site as open, enrolled, or camp sites.
An open site is operated in low-income areas where at least half of the children in the area come from families with incomes at or below 185 percent of the federal poverty level, which also makes they eligible for free and reduced-price school meals. At an open site, meals are served to any child, completely free of charge; no questions asked.
Enrolled sites provide free meals to children who are currently enrolled in some type of ongoing activity or program at the actual site where at least half of them are eligible for free or reduced-price meals.
The third type of SFSP program is called a camp. Camps may participate in this type of food program also; however, in this case the camps only receive reimbursement from the government for those meals served to children who qualify for free or reduced-lunch, according to the USDA.
Katie Thomas, a food service technician working at the Ville Platte High School site, stated that 18-year-old individuals can still receive free meals and snacks through SFSP if they are either mentally or physically disabled.
Typically, sites are only prepared to serve one or two reimbursable meals per day. In some situations, primarily in camps and sites that serve migrant children, the USDA may approve and reimburse the site for three meals per person, per day.
Many people are unaware of this program, but the SFSP is not a new program. In fact it has been in existence since it started as a part of a larger pilot program in 1968. Appropriately it became it’s own program in 1975. Since that time, the SFSP has been helping children get the nutrition they need for healthy growth and development.
According to a report published in 2012 by the USDA, more than 2.28 million children participated in the SFSP at almost 39,000 sites in the summer of 2012. Congress appropriated $398 million for the SFSP meals served in 2012. By comparison, in 1980, the program cost $110.1 million.
“Too many times people simply don’t understand how much money and effort these types of programs require; but at the end of the day, all that really matters is seeing these children healthy and happy,” Bradley said. “Many times, unfortunately, this is the only meal some of these children see all day. And as this program continues to grow, we hope to change that statistic, one child at a time.”