Kariann Lubin walked to Faith Mission Baptist Church pushing an empty stroller alongside her two sons to wait in line, surrounded by idling cars.
But the stroller wasn’t for her kids: 11 year-old Kaiden and six year-old Michael. It was for food.
Lubin goes to the church twice a week during the summer, using the stroller to help her carry several plastic bags worth of food, packed with enough breakfasts and lunches to last her family three or four days.
“It’s nice not having to plan meals every single minute of the day — three meals, two snacks, sometimes three or four snacks,” Lubin said. “This takes all that weight off my shoulders.”
Lubin is one of many Alachua County parents who rely on the Summer Meals Program. This federally-funded initiative offers free meals to all children under 18 regardless of income, school enrollment or residency. It runs from June 9th to July 25th and is operated by Alachua County Public Schools Food and Nutrition Services (FNS) in partnership with the United States Department of Agriculture.
Meals are distributed at more than 75 schools and community sites across the county during the summer, including non-congregate mobile locations like the one at Faith Mission. The dates and times that meals are served vary from site to site.
“If you’re unsure about using the program, don’t be,” Lubin said. “It helps so much. It just takes off a huge weight of planning those meals and snacks during the summer when you have all your kids home.”
Robin Levine, an accountant at the University of Florida, brings home meals for her daughter Claire, who is in elementary school. She said the structure and nutritional consistency of the summer meals have been invaluable.
“It provides a consistency with the meals she’s provided at her school each day,” Levine said. “It’s a benefit to our family that I don’t have to worry about providing lunches, breakfasts and snacks to her every day.”
She started using the program last summer after hearing about it from her daughter’s school and encourages others to do the same.
“Take advantage of the benefit,” she said. “So it can continue in the future.”
At the core of the program is Caron Rowe, a food service supervisor with FNS. She helps coordinate meal sites, oversee USDA compliance and ensure kids across the county get fed.
“We want to make sure that people know it’s for everyone that has children 0 to 18,” Rowe said. “It’s just a way to provide those familiar things to families.”
This summer, seven mobile sites are operating across Alachua County including Archer, East Gainesville, High Springs, Waldo, Newberry and Hawthorne. These are the only locations where families can pick up bags of ingredients to prepare breakfast and lunch at home. Open on Mondays and Thursdays, the sites provide enough food to cover the week, if families go on both days.
These mobile locations were introduced during the COVID-19 pandemic, but have now become a permanent part of the program.
“It’s like a present,” Rowe said, describing how children eagerly opened their meal bags on the spot.
Last summer, the program served more than 113,000 lunches and 81,000 breakfasts.
“We hope the USDA continues to recognize the need for these sites,” she added. “It’s a lot easier for families.”
At Gainesville High School, students line up in a bustling cafeteria filled with the scent of hot nachos and trays of grab-and-go items like apples, yogurt and sandwiches. It’s one of the many congregate meal sites where kids eat on campus.
Kristen Williams, a food service specialist for Alachua County, had just finished supervising lunch service when she leaned against a metal counter and smiled.
“We really strive for excellence,” she said. “From quality to compliance to customer service—it’s truly, truly dear to our hearts.”
Families who visit school-based sites for meals are asked to check in at the front office where children must eat their meals on campus. Enrollment in the school or participation in any specific program is not required, and eligibility for free or reduced-cost meals during the school year does not affect access. Many children enrolled in summer or specialty classes at these schools take advantage of the program.
Williams, who’s been with the county for eight years, helps design the rotating three-week menu that includes 15 different meals. Each one is chosen with kids in mind and often features fresh, locally sourced produce through the district’s farm-to-school program. For example, one of the meals offered through the program uses okra grown from a local farmer in Alachua.
“We have a huge farm-to-school hub,” she said. “It’s always important to me as the meal planner to give them options they want to see: Grilled cheese, peanut butter jelly, grab-and-go kits.”
Over the years, she’s even singled out one meal she loves from the program.
“I’m a grilled cheese person,” she said. “That’s the one meal that no matter where you’re from it just makes you feel good.”
Parents like Lubin say the help is more than financial, it’s emotional. With two kids and inconsistent work as a babysitter during the summer, she said the program has saved her about $200 a month, or close to $700 a summer.
“I have a job. I work from home. But still, having these meals just takes off another burden that you really shouldn’t have to bear, especially when it comes to just feeding your family.”
With all the money the program has saved, she is taking her family on a trip this summer. Her kids are ecstatic.
“I can’t wait to go on vacation,” said Kaiden, Lubin’s 11 year-old son. “It’s all thanks to the free food I’m eating right now.”
As the summer temperatures rise and families juggle childcare, work and growing grocery bills, the meals, packed into coolers in vans or served under cafeteria lights, offer more than sustenance.
“This program is really a blessing,” Kariann Lubin said. “It helps more than people might think.”
For more information, visit the Summer Meals Program to find specific dates, times or site locations.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by PostX News and is published from a syndicated feed.)
