Thanks to Summer Food 4 Kids, children in Hillsboro are guaranteed to be able to eat lunch Monday through Friday from 12-12:30 p.m. at First Mennonite Church.
“It’s open to anyone 18 and under. We don’t check proof of income or anything. If you are hungry and want to eat, you can walk up, bike, ride your skates up or drive up to the hut in the parking lot and get a meal. We just serve everybody who shows up,” said Co-coordinator Kayla Gallaway.
The program began 10 years ago when Co-coordinator Norma Duerksen started it at Trinity Mennonite Church in Hillsboro.
“It started when I heard on NPR that the Wichita food bank had food to distribute to summer kids when they don’t have school lunches. But they didn’t have distribution centers. If towns would just have places to distribute the food, they would provide the food. And so I said, ‘We can do that’. Trinity became the place where the Wichita food bank dropped off the food, and then we served at tables in the Trinity church,” said Duerksen.
Unfortunately they had to pay for the food from the food bank because Hillsboro didn’t have a high enough percentage of poverty to meet the qualifications for the program.
“They were supposed to be well-balanced meals, but the kids were just not eating soy butter and raisins and the things that would have made it a balanced meal. And so our people said, ‘Hey, we’re cooks. We could make hot meat dishes and have fresh vegetables and fruit and cookies’,” said Duerksen. “When I called the school district, they said there were over 200 kids with free and reduced lunches. And that’s who we were kind of focusing on—our children who were at risk for food scarcity during the summer.”
The group began cooking and more people and churches started helping out.
“It became citywide. It wasn’t just Trinity then. It became all the churches involved,” said Duerksen.
In addition to serving the kids food, they would have a male adult sit at every table to supervise and create conversation.
“I visited with the police department, the school district and the mayor and said, tell me about Hillsboro. Tell me about where the gaps are that a church could fill. The mayor at the time said we need to face that we have poverty here in Hillsboro. We need to admit that. And the superintendent said churches could provide strong male role models for kids who have single-parent homes,” said Duerksen.
But then COVID-19 hit and Summer Food 4 Kids became a drive-by program. Afterward they tried to return to the table model but the numbers dropped.
“After COVID, we realized these parents did not want to drag their kids into the church, have them sit, have them eat, have them do chores of scraping off the plates and cleaning off the tables. They just weren’t up to that. We also heard moms with bigger families say they didn’t have time to get all six kids in the car to the church on time on a lunch break,” said Gallaway.
The program moved back to the drive by option.
“It was a hard decision. We didn’t have that conversation at the table with the kids. We miss that. But drive-by fed 3,000 more people. Our goal was to feed children—families at risk of food scarcity. That was the main goal. And so we decided to go back to feeding people bagged lunches,” said Duerksen.
They now offer the lunches at First Mennonite Church in Hillsboro since Trinity closed last year. And the program continues to be successful and grow.
“In June, we served 300 more meals than we did last year at this time. So the need is great. The need is still there,” said Duerksen.
The group also gives the adults with the children food.
“We’ve decided that if the children are hungry, the parents are, too. And so we serve the whole family. We see three kids in the backseat, and mom’s driving or grandma’s driving, then we give a meal for her, too,” said Gallaway.
Each bag contains a hot meat dish, a bag of fresh veggies and a container of ranch to dip them in, a bag of fresh fruit, a bag of two cookies and a bottle of water. They also get a pool pass for the day.
“They get two different kinds of cookies and almost always homemade by ladies in the community. Thousands and thousands of cookies. Yesterday we served 76 meals so that’s 152 cookies. They disappear quickly,” said Duerksen.
The program could not happen without the volunteers. Volunteers help every step of the way from a local farmer donating a cow to other food items being donated. And volunteers show up all week long to help bag the items for the sack lunches.
“We are so thankful to the many people and businesses that help us. We couldn’t do it without all of them and all of the churches who donate their time and resources,” said Duerksen. “I feel like this is a whole community working together to do this project, and it’s just such a God thing—to hear it on NPR, start the program, have donations from businesses and churches and individuals—just beyond anything that I could plan or do. It’s just so fun to be a part of something beyond my imagination.”
The program is always looking for more help as well.
“We have regular volunteers who come, but sometimes they are gone so we could use subs for them. And we can always use more food items and monetary donations,” said Duerksen.
To donate items, money or time, please contact Kayla Galloway at 620-635-7165 or Norma Duerksen at 620-381-0949.For meals, go to First Mennonite Church at 102 S. Ash St in Hillsboro and pull up to the wooden hut in the south parking lot. Food is served from 12-12:30 p.m. Monday through Friday.
