AUSTIN, Texas (AP) – When schools started closing across the U.S. during the coronavirus pandemic, they scrambled to keep feeding millions of students from poor families who depend on free and reduced-price meals every day.
Cities big and small quickly ran into problems: food workers, teachers and volunteers manning curbside pickup locations came down with the virus themselves or were too scared to report for duty. Some districts have been forced to suspend their programs altogether.
That’s left families already struggling to put food on the table more desperate and schools searching for ways to keep serving those in need safely. Among the biggest school districts to suspend its federally assisted meal program was in Houston, the nation’s fourth-largest city, after a worker was exposed to the coronavirus.
“We said, ‘Oh, my God, we have to close down because we don’t know what’s happening,'” said Betti Wiggins, nutrition services officer for the Houston Independent School District.
It stopped giving out meals for more than a week. When the program reopened this week, it had a new way of packaging and handing out food. Instead of providing small meals every day citywide, the district now has fewer, centralized locations where people pick up 30-pound bags stuffed with chicken, potatoes, apples, juice and more. They’re designed to last a family of four several days.