Congress will soon be considering the reauthorization of the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010, which will expire September 30, 2015. The Child Nutrition and WIC Reauthorization Act authorizes all of the federal child nutrition programs, including the School Breakfast, National School Lunch, Child and Adult Care Food, Summer Food Service, the Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Programs and WIC. These programs provide funding to help ensure that more than 200,000 low-income Arkansas children have access to healthy, nutritious foods where they live, learn and play. It is up to Congress to review, modify and reauthorize these child nutrition programs that touch the lives of millions of low-income children each day, and that research shows improve educational achievement, economic security, nutrition and health. Reauthorization provides an opportunity to improve and strengthen these critical programs.

The Arkansas Hunger Relief Alliance, Arkansas No Kid Hungry campaign and countless hunger advocates around the nation support the modification of the Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 to: 1) make the application process and regulations of the Summer Food Service Program (SFSP) and Child and Adult Care Program (CACFP) more streamline and integrated, and 2) eliminate the congregate feeding requirement. We also support Senator Boozman’s legislation (the Hunger-Free Summer for Kids Act or Senate bill 1966) that makes additional food credits available to low-income parents during the summer months.

The Case of Augusta, Arkansas: Transitioning from Summer to Afterschool Meals Programs

ARCare is a health center and day care in Augusta, Arkansas. Augusta is a high need area with a child food insecurity rate of 31 percent and 80 percent of its children income-eligible for free/reduced price school lunch and school breakfast. There were previously very few summer meals sites serving  Woodruff County. In 2013 ARCare―an organization that serves rural families by providing high quality medical care and educational programs for children from birth to 18 years of age― decided to help remedy the situation by participating in the USDA Summer Food Service Program, which provides free meals to children in low income areas during the summer.  After running the program in 2013, they decided against continuing the program in 2014. Participation in the program was low, but ultimately the real thing that deterred them from continuing the program was that it was too difficult for their workers to learn all the regulations for Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP) ―which they run for their Day Care Center― and then transition to different regulations for SFSP in the summer. If the two programs were integrated so that people who are already administering CACFP would be able to seamlessly transition their programs to SFSP, we would be able to retain more sponsors in high need locations like Augusta.

 The Case of Montgomery County, Arkansas:  No Place to Go

The congregate feeding requirement―which specifies that children must eat on-site and cannot take the food home― presented a significant barrier for a number of potential sponsors in Montgomery County.  Montgomery County had zero summer meals feeding sites prior to 2014. As a high need county with a child food insecurity rate of 31 percent and 90 percent of its children income-eligible for free/reduced price school lunch and school breakfast , the likelihood was great that too many Montgomery county children would not get enough to eat during the summer when school was out.  The Arkansas No Kid Hungry team was able to help formulate a solution for 2014. We partnered with an out-of-county sponsor to take meals to a group of kids that met at a 4-H Center three times over the summer.  While this solution helped provide some kids with summer meals in 2014, it was not sustainable. Why? The real barrier in Montgomery County is that it is extremely rural, and there are no central places where children can congregate easily in the summer.  This makes it impossible to provide meals to locations that children could actually get to. As a consequence, there were no summer meals sites in Montgomery County in the summer of 2015. If the congregate feeding requirement were to be removed, outside sponsors like Central Arkansas Development Council or Child Care Community Outreach, could take meals to kids in scattered rural locations, or parents could go to one centralized spot,  pick up the meals and take them home to the their kids.

Summer is Expensive for Low Income Families

Feeding children in the summer when school is out presents low-income families with additional financial stress. On average, families spend an additional $300 per month to feed their kids who would receive free or reduced price meals at school. Providing eligible, low-income families with additional food benefits during the summer would help relieve the added stress on families and help insure kids get enough to eat when school is out.

More than 200,000 Arkansas children are considered food insecure. Please contact your Senators and let them know you support the Hunger Free Summer for Kids Act of 2015 (S.1966), and urge them to strengthen the child nutrition programs that mean so much to so many Arkansas children.