One out of three children in Leon County don't have consistent access to healthy, nutritious food. That's according to Second Harvest of the Big Bend. Their Summer BreakSpot Food on the Move van is helping kids stay fed all summer long.
Food on the Move travels to seven different neighborhoods around Leon County on two different routes. The routes run Monday Wednesday, Friday, and Tuesday, Thursday from now until August 4.
One of their stops is Brittany estates. Nine-year-old Samuel Dakota is excited to eat lunch with his friends.
"I used to live here. Me and buddy used to live here," said Dakota. "We usually get food because I like lunch and it's good."
Some of their favorites, "The cheese. Cheezits. The uncrustables."
Second Harvest packs around 50 meals in their food on the move van to bring into four different neighborhoods throughout Leon County everyday so kids can come and eat lunch on a regular basis throughout the summer.
Molly Boykin is the Child Nutrition Programs Coordinator with Second Harvest. She said kids can sit and have lunch at each stop for 45 minutes. Boykin said they normally feed anywhere from 30 to 80 children on their routes each day.
"A lot of the families we are serving do not have access to reliable transportation or some of these kiddos are left home alone, they're perfectly safe to do so, but they may not have that consistent access to healthy nutrition," said Boykin.
She said they've seen an increase in need in some neighborhoods, but also a decrease in others.
"A lot of those families have moved out of that area. Income eligibility has changed for some of the locations that we go to which has pushed some of those more in need children out and decrease the population that we're serving," said Boykin.
However, bringing the food into the kids' neighborhoods has helped expand their reach.
"Us going in and actually setting up tables, going into their environment, a familiar space for them a safe space for them makes it so we're taking a lot of those barriers away that families are constantly concerned about," said Boykin.
It's not just kids in Leon County that are getting free lunches this summer.
Second Harvest also has Summer Breakspot sites in Taylor and Madison Counties as well.
