EVERETT—Representative Rick Larsen (WA-02) served meals to kids at the Alderwood Boys & Girls Club on Friday, August 30, to highlight the need for passing the Summer Meals Act of 2024, a bipartisan bill to fight childhood hunger by expanding access to healthy, nutritious meals and snacks offered to students during the summer months.

“Kids should be focused on learning and getting good grades instead of worrying about where their next meal will come from,” said Larsen. “One in six children in Washington state faces hunger. With schools out, summer months are especially hard for children in low-income and underserved communities. The Summer Meals Act builds partnerships and breaks down barriers to ensure children in the Pacific Northwest and across the country get regular, healthy meals, regardless of the season.”

The Summer Meals Act reforms and expands the Summer Food Service Program (SFSP), a federal initiative that funds meals served by nonprofit organizations, school districts and public agencies to children during the summer months by:

• Allows site sponsors to operate year-round, enabling SFSP participants to operate more efficiently.
• Lowers the area eligibility threshold from 50 percent to 40 percent, allowing areas with at least 40 percent of students receiving free or reduced lunch to participate in the SFSP.
• Allows summer meal sites to serve three, rather than two, meals per day.
• Funds grants to encourage innovative meal delivery, such as through mobile meal trucks, to help increase food access for children in rural and underserved areas.

Currently, 35% of Edmonds School District students are eligible for free and reduced lunches.

“In our district, over 8,200 students qualify for free and reduced lunch, but we know many more could benefit from this proposed legislation,” said Edmonds School District Superintendent Dr. Rebecca Miner. “This initiative aligns closely with our district’s mission to support the well-being and success of every student. I am confident it would have a lasting, positive impact on our students and their learning.”

Ruth Cassidy, Unit Director at Boys & Girls Clubs of Snohomish County for the Alderwood location, shared with the Lynnwood Time how the Free/Reduced Meal Program helped a mother after being laid-off her job earlier this year.

“To know that she can send the kids here, know that they will be fed, know that they had a morning snack, afternoon, and an evening snack, was just a relief for her,” Cassidy said. “She has been struggling…. Knowing that we took care of the food for a majority of the day during summer, saved their lives.”

The Edmonds School District through Meadowdale High School has been providing healthy lunches to the kids at the Alderwood Boys & Girls Club through its Free/Reduced Meals Program. Families qualify based on financial need.

The Alderwood Boys & Girls Club serves three meals a day, however not every site does, Larsen told the Lynnwood Times. The Summer Meals Act will rectify this inequality.

From Monday through Thursday from 12-12:30 p.m. the meals served at the Boys & Girls Club include grains, proteins, fresh fruits or vegetables and milk. On Friday, kids were served yogurt, string cheese, chips or sunflower seeds, chicken nuggets, tuna or chicken sandwiches and fruits and vegetables.

Cassidy informed the Lynnwood Times that the Alderwood location serves 30 lunches per day. During the summer, countywide, the Boys & Girls Club serves approximately 4,000 kids per day and 29,000 children year-round. Boys & Girls Club pays for the snacks they purchase from Costco, whereas the lunch program is free, courtesy of the school district.

“We know that kids do better if they are fed, both with academic behavior and their lifestyles,” Marci Volmer, Chief Operating Officer of the Boys & Girls Club of Snohomish County told the Lynnwood Times. “We are committed at the Boys & Girls Club that they [kids] have food, but it is a big strain…any help we can get it is fantastic.”

Larsen, the bills primary sponsor, has been working since 2014 to pass this legislation that was originally introduced by the late Republican Representative Don Young of Alaska. The bill seems to stall in the House Committee on Education and Labor each time it is introduced.

Larsen hopes that by amending the Summer Meals Act to this year’s farm bill may get the votes needed to pass the House and eventually the Senate to be signed into law this year.

Besides serving meals, Larsen took questions from kids in the club’s James W. Corcoran Memorial Gymnasium.  He shared about his time as a kid with the Boys & Girls club, what congress does, and the benefit of the Summer Meals Act.

In 2022, Rep. Larsen was honored as the 2022 Champion of Youth by Boys & Girls Clubs of America. As a youth, he was a member of the Arlington Boys & Girls Clubs where he played basketball.

To read more about the Summer Meals Act, click here and for its fact sheet, click here.