Oklahoma coalition making plans to expand the number of summer feeding sites for youth

The Oklahoma Childhood Food Security Coalition wants to make Summer 2024 a Summer Without Hunger.

The coalition has set up meetings in three regions of the state to identify entities that want to help and sites that can be used to establish summer feeding programs. For Southwest Oklahoma, that site is the Lawton Farmers Market on March 12. The goal: provide children with food security during the summer months, when school — where many low-income students receive free or reduced-priced breakfast and lunch — is out of session.

Organizers said the regional sessions will help engage organizations, school districts and partners to increase participation in the Summer Meals program. They also are an opportunity for persons and organizations to learn about the ways they can participate, with discussion topics at the four-hour sessions to include effective community outreach, storytelling, coordinating legislative visits, engaging families and children, and establishing meals in rural areas.

Melissa Sims, community engagement and health planning coordinator with Comanche County Health Department/Region 5, said while the meetings are a relatively new idea, the work to be highlighted there has been constant, in terms of increasing involvement and participation in nutrition programs.

“The Childhood Food Security Coalition has been working to spread the news and support organizations that are acting as or working to become feeding sites or sponsors,” she said.

Some programs already exist — Lawton Public Schools has offered an active and growing summer nutrition program for years — but Sims said the goal is to expand so those 18 years old and younger “have access to no-cost, healthy meals and snacks during summer break.”

While there are three summer nutrition programs in Comanche County in Lawton, Fletcher and Geronimo, Kiowa, Tillman, Beckham and Harmon counties don’t have any sites at all. Other Southwest Oklahoma counties are a mixed bag: Caddo County has three sites (Anadarko, Fort Cobb and Carnegie), while Cotton, Greer and Jackson counties have one each in Temple, Granite and Altus.

Coalition members want more, in terms of sponsors and sites that can host feeding programs, Sims said, adding there also are potential improvements for existing sites. For example, she said while Lawton has multiple feeding sites “through the amazing work of the LPS nutrition program,” coalition members want to build on that (transportation to feeding sites can be an obstacle, she said).

“We are working to remove as many barrier as we can,” she said.

That’s why the March 12 meeting is important, because coalition members want and need both financial sponsors and physical locations.

“There is also an afterschool meal program that we would love to build — to get nutritious, affordable (free) meals and snacks to as many children as possible,” she said.

According to the coalition, the Summer Food Service Program is a U.S. Department of Agriculture child nutrition program designed to fill a hunger gap for youth when school is not in session. In Oklahoma, the program is administered by the Oklahoma Department of Education, which provides federal reimbursements to sponsors of every qualifying meal served.

Sites must be located in a school attendance area where at least 50 percent of students are eligible for free and reduced-price lunch. Sponsors have the task of providing oversight to those sites and submitting claims for reimbursement.