Great Plains Food Bank Youth Summer Meals Program Launching June 1

The food bank has reached a record high of 18 meal pick-up locations throughout North Dakota.

FARGO, N.D. (KVRR) — Summer vacation is around the corner leaving many kids without school meals, the Great Plains Food Bank is helping keep kids fed during the long break.

“They can come to pick up five days’ worth of meals from us on just that one day of pickup, which is just great. They get their full balanced meal with their milk and some snacks with it,” Great Plains Food Bank Program Director Nancy Carriveau said.

Great Plains Food Bank is leaving no child left hungry this summer vacation. The organization is back again with its Youth Summer Meals Program kicking off from June 1st and going until August.

“We help meet the gap where kids who rely on meals during the school year from their school and they may not have access to meals during the summer, so we help fill that gap, along with many other community partners who also do summer meal programs,” Carriveau explained.

Last year, the food bank recorded serving nearly nine thousand meals at seven locations for children in need. The food bank has reached a record high of 18 meal pick-up locations throughout North Dakota.

“Looking to serve nearly 1,000 kids from this program and usually, it’s a couple of hundreds. We’re normally really concentrated in the Fargo-Moorhead area and Bismarck for our meals. We’re serving all the way out to Williams County, Grenora, and Trenton,” Carriveau said.

One of the taglines for Great Plains is reducing the barriers to access. With the pandemic, the food bank was able to expand its footprint into new locations.

“Income guidelines. Specifics around where they can be done and how they can be accessed have been taken away because of COVID-19 and they’ve been expanded. Same thing with the schools. How the schools can do the meals that they’re doing,” Carriveau said.

Program Director Nancy Carriveau says the five-day meal packages come with an entre, milk, juice, and some snacks. There’s one more piece of information for families in the Fargo and West Fargo areas.

Carriveau shares that the food bank “partnered with the Little Red Reading Bus through the West Fargo Education Foundation, so they’re like a library on wheels, so they have four or five different sites this year that they’re doing and kids can come and check out library books from them and get a meal and get produce because we’re going to have a farmer’s market with them.”

Below is a list of locations to pick up meals. You can find more information here.

JAMESTOWN 
TRAC
June 1 – August 18
11:30 A.M. – 12 P.M.
Monday through Saturday

Nickeus Park
June 7 – August 6
11:30 a.m. – 12 p.m.
Monday through Friday (not on July 5)

Leapaldt Park
June 7 – August 6
11:30 a.m. – 12 p.m.
Monday through Friday (no July 5)

Meidinger Park
June 7 – August 6
11:30 a.m. – 12 p.m.
Monday through Friday (no July 5)

Arts Park
June 1 – August 14
11:45 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.
Monday through Thursday

Stutsman Co. Extension
June 1 – August 27
11:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.
Monday through Friday (no July 5)

ENDERLIN
First Lutheran Church
June 1 – August 24
12-1 p.m.
Tuesday and Thursday

WEST FARGO
Tintes Park
June 1 – August 10
6:30-7:30 p.m.
Tuesday evening

South Elmwood
June 3 – August 5
6:30-7:30 p.m.
Thursday evening

Community Presbyterian Church
June 7 – August 20
12-1 p.m.
Monday through Friday

FARGO
Village West Park
June 1 –  August 10
5-6 p.m.
Tuesday evening

Willow Park
June 3 – August 5
5-6 p.m.
Thursday evening

GRENORA
Community Center
June 2 – August 11
4-7 p.m.
Wednesday

TRENTON
331 4th Ave. E
June 1 – August 12
Tuesday 8 a.m. – 1 p.m.
Thursday 12-6:30 p.m.

BISMARCK
Kiwanis Park
June 7 – August 18
12-1 p.m.
Wednesday

CASSELTON
Central Cass Elementary
May 31 – August 23
12-12:30 p.m.
Monday

MAPLETON
Mapleton Elementary
June 7 – July 26
1-1:30 p.m.
Monday

CHAFFEE
Across from Bronco Café
May 31 – August 23
11-11:30 a.m.
Monday