Take-home summer meals expand access for Upper Valley children

BETHEL — In the first week of the summer, the White River Valley Supervisory Union distributed over 1,000 free meals to kids at the Bethel Elementary School alone, one of four to-go summer meal sites the district is running this year.

“I just want to feed kids. I just want to make sure kids have access to healthy nutritious foods at all times,” District Food Service Director Mischa Johnson said in an interview.

The WRVSU operates a U.S. Department of Agriculture-affiliated open summer meals program where children 18 and under can get free breakfast and lunch all summer long with no sign-up or income information required.

Until 2023 — outside of exceptions made during the COVID-19 pandemic — USDA rules only allowed community organizations to offer in-person meals throughout the summer.

Now, community organizations in qualifying rural areas can offer each child meal kits with up to seven days of breakfast and lunch foods.

“If you’re in a rural area, there’s not a lot of options where kids gather to have access to meals on a daily basis,” Anore Horton, executive director of Hunger Free Vermont, said in a Wednesday interview. “It’s really difficult for a working parent to get a kid to a meal site every day.”

When Johnson, who has run the program for four years and oversees food service during the school year, learned about the take-home option last April it was too late to set up for that summer. But, she tried it on a small scale in addition to the in-person meals program and distributed about 10,000 take-home meals over six weeks.

“That showed me right then and there there’s a true need in this community to offer these meal kits to bridge the gap,” she said.

This year, take-home meal kits are available to anyone 18 and under. They include seven days worth of breakfast and lunch foods for one child, including bread, deli meat, yogurt, peanut butter, fruits and vegetables, muffins, cereal and a half a gallon each of chocolate and regular milk.

Children or a parent or guardian can pick up kits once per week with “no questions asked” at the Bethel Elementary School on Thursdays from 3 to 5 p.m., at the South Royalton Elementary School and the First Branch Unified District Chelsea campus on Fridays from 3 to 5 p.m. and at the West Fairlee Public Library every Tuesday from 3 to 6 p.m.

Next week, pick up will be on July 3 because of the holiday on Friday.

WRVSU started preparing meals for West Fairlee, which is part of the Rivendell Interstate School District, last summer after being asked by Hunger Free Vermont to add another site.

Participants do not have to live in any particular town to collect meals through WRVSU.

Growing need

The summer meals program is a reimbursement program through the USDA. Any community in which at least 50% of children are considered low-income can run a summer meals program through a local sponsor, such as a school district.

Since January, the Trump administration has made changes and cuts to USDA food service programs. But so far, Johnson said she has not been affected.

“Until I’m told otherwise about some big cut, I’m going to keep going forward,” Johnson said.

In general, summer meal programs have been insulated from major changes to the USDA’s food service programs, Horton said. While there is some uncertainty on the horizon, for now summer meal programs are going “full steam ahead.”

In the last two years the number of summer meals served in Vermont has dramatically increased, with over 1 million in 2024 compared to 655,000 in 2023, according to Horton and data from Hunger Free Vermont. This is partly because of the take-home meal option which has made food accessible in new areas, but another likely factor is that food prices in Vermont have risen 30% in the last two years, Horton said.

“Now more than ever, go use these summer meal programs, everybody who shows up, the more kids who use these summer meal programs the more funding we get to draw down from the federal government and bring into Vermont to use in our communities,” said Horton.

Beginning Monday, June 30, the Hartford Community Coalition will be providing weekly meal bags with five-days worth of food for pick up at the White River School in White River Junction from 4:30 to 6 p.m. on Mondays and at Cornerstone Community Center in Hartford Village from 10:45 a.m. to 1:15 p.m. on Wednesdays.

The Coalition asks that families sign up in advance so they can prepare the right number of meals. Information is online at tinyurl.com/3xcht33f.

Summer meals will be available for pick up at the Windsor School starting July 7. Breakfast is available every weekday from 7:30 to 9:30 a.m. and lunch from 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.

Other districts have had to make unique arrangements to facilitate the program this year.

The Orange East Supervisory Union is not offering summer meals on its own but the district partnered with the Barre (Vt.) Unified Union School District to offer meals at the Waits River Valley School in East Corinth as a “satellite” program.

The OESU stopped offering summer meals in 2023 as pandemic-era funding and guidelines went away. Now, Waits River Principal Carlotta Simonds-Perantoni said the district is working to bring back a summer program but they weren’t ready this year. It will take more time to organize appropriate staffing, training, paperwork and to ensure that there is a facility and food offerings that are up to USDA standards district-wide, she said.

While Simonds-Perantoni insisted the district is “going to rock it next year” with its own program that is in the works, “we were adamant that we needed to find a way to feed these children and help these families” this year. At her request, the district and Hunger Free Vermont and the Vermont Food Bank helped to facilitate the partnership.

The Waits River Valley School is not an “open” meals site. While Simonds-Perantoni usually procures a “few extra meals” from Barre in case they are needed, participants are asked to sign up for the program by contacting her directly at 802-431-5172 or Carlotta.Simonds-Perantoni@oesu.org. Participants should live in the OESU communities, but they do not have to be enrolled at Waits River and there is still no income requirement.

Families can pick up meal kits with a rotating selection of prepared meals rather than ingredients. This week, kits included sandwiches, Caesar salad, crispy chicken wraps, bagels, muffins, fresh fruit, milk and more. Pickup is split between two days; three days worth of meals are available on Mondays and two days worth on Wednesdays from 12 to 2 p.m. at Waits River Valley School.

Other side of river

In New Hampshire, the offerings are more variable.

The Haverhill School District qualifies for the USDA’s program and offers five-day meal bags for pick-up at Woodsville High School on Fridays from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. The program is open to children in the Upper Valley communities of Haverhill and Piermont. There will be no pick up next week because of Independence Day.

And in Lebanon, five-day meal kits will be available at the downtown public library from 12 to 1 p.m. on Wednesdays. They are distributed through the New Hampshire Food Bank on a “first-come, first-served basis.”

In other communities that do not meet the USDA’s income threshold or where school districts and community organizations have not sponsored a program, other groups have stepped up to fill in the gaps.

The Claremont Soup Kitchen distributes meals daily in locations around the city in the summer. Families can pick up breakfast and lunch on weekdays from 12 to 1 p.m. at the soup kitchen, Barnes Park and 135 Maple Avenue.

Since last year, the Mascoma Valley Regional School District has not met federal income standards that previously allowed it to offer a summer meals program through the USDA. But, the Friends of Mascoma operates three food pantries in the summer at Mascoma Valley Regional High School, in Canaan and soon at a new location on Main Street in Enfield.

As for the demand, the Friends distributed 10,000 more pounds of food in 2024 than 2023 and they are “on track to increase by that amount, at least, in 2025,” Heidi Reynolds, Friends of Mascoma’s executive director, said in an email.

“We are welcoming new shoppers every week and are seeing some shoppers who have not visited for a year or more return,” Reynolds wrote.

Clare Shanahan can be reached at cshanahan@vnews.com or 603-727-3216.