This year free lunch was only offered three days of the week at Woodlawn Elementary School. In previous years, free lunch was offered at multiple locations (Lawrence Public Library, Lawrence Arts Center, and various elementary schools) every day of the week.

According to USD 497 Director of Wellness and Nutrition Julie Henry, the location changes have not caused any change in free lunch participation.

“We have been averaging 10-60 kids at Woodlawn each day,” Henry said. “This is in line with what we were projecting for that site, and is in-line with what participation was like at the Library and the Arts Center. Our current production and staffing is adequate for the number of participants that we have been having at Woodlawn.”

In addition to the decreased free lunch locations, this year’s availability of free Boys and Girls Club lunches were reduced. Boys and Girls Club was unable to qualify two of their three sites for federal funding. In previous years, these lunches were open to the community to buy for reduced rates. This year, Boys and Girls Club has partnered with Just Food to provide free lunches to kids.

The Vice President of the Boys and Girls Club Program Natalie Diggs said that the program cuts have created roadblocks preventing Boys and Girls Club from helping the community to the best of their ability.

“It has made it more difficult to fully serve families who need us most,” Diggs said. “Many families both in BGC and in the community at large relied on meals at BGC and/or the ‘community feeding program’ at BGC sites to provide complete meals to their children everyday in the summer.”

Jessica Jackson, a regular visitor of BGC, said having to supply summer lunches was a big change.

“I understand why there have been changes made,” Jackson said. “I do not like these changes as this puts extra stress on our food budget, accounting for an extra one to two meals per day. Our routines have changed to allow for extra prep time with making meals each night or in the morning.”