Boost Families and Our Economy with Year-Round Meals for Kids

This week, Sen. Patty Murray, Rep. Mike Levin, and Rep. Jahana Hayes introduced the Stop Child Hunger Act to ensure that students and families that struggle with hunger have year-round access to grocery assistance when schools close due to emergencies or scheduled breaks. Northwest Harvest applauds this legislation which will impact more than half a million Washington kids or put another way, about half of all registered Washington students. Students of color–especially Black, Indigenous, and Pacific Islander kids-experience deeper need for free and reduced-price meals.

When schools close, kids who struggle with hunger are more likely to miss nutritious meals that can keep them healthier and better able to focus again on the task of learning when schools reopen. Missing school meals also means added economic hardship and anxiety for parents and caretakers who struggle to afford the added food needed to replace breakfasts and lunches. We hear far too often that without increased resources or added hours at work, adults end up skipping meals so their kids can eat first.

The Stop Child Hunger Act would help ensure added assistance during school closures for each student that is eligible for free or reduced-price meals by providing families with an EBT card with the money equivalent of school breakfasts and lunches for each day that schools are closed for five or more days. This assistance can only be spent on food at grocery stores and retailers that are certified to accept EBT. This puts food on family tables and fuels our local food economies: buying groceries means revenue and jobs for local businesses and farms. It’s a win-win solution.

The Stop Child Hunger Act joins other important legislation to provide meals and added resources for struggling families to enact nutrition priorities outlined in President Biden’s American Families Plan, a package designed to provide resources for low-income families to help them be healthy for work and school. Our economy and our communities are healthier when all can access nutritious food and basic necessities. Join us in calling on Congress to move quickly and enact the American Families Plan to make the once in a lifetime investment that can give families that have struggled the most during COVID get back on their feet.

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