MANATEE COUNTY – “When school is closed its important that we go out and find the kids,” said Director of Food and Nutrition Service of Manatee County, Regina Thoma.
Manatee County Schools will feed kids in nine different locations over Spring Break Vacation
“We’re also doing two drive thru sites, at schools which are King Middle and Buffalo Creek Middle School,” said Thoma.
Director of Food and Nutrition Services for Manatee County Schools, Regina Thoma, says for many students, the only meals they get is at school
“So when school is out unfortunately, they may not have access to meals, or their family is food insecure and food is available but it is very limited so it’s important that we continue to reach our students even when school is closed,” said Thoma.
Each student will receive a free lunch and a snack for the day. Thoma says the free meals take a burden off of parents.
“Where money is in short supply right now and people are trying to figure out how to do all the things they need to do for their families, it does help them and it saves them several dollars every day, even just for one student, by being able to get their meals so it’s very important,” said Thoma.
Thoma says each location has been geared towards meeting the most needs
“We know where the successful locations are, of course when COVID happened last year, we learned even more about where the best access points we’re for meals and we also did a large winter meal program that gave us even more information.”
Each bus has three separate locations locations and will start distributing meals at 11:30 and will run through 2:30 in the afternoon, March 15th through 19th.
Three Food and Nutrition Services Mobile Feeding Buses will deliver the meals to the following nine stops:
- Bus #1 Locations: Bradenton Village Apartments 11:30 a.m. – 12 p.m., Turner Chapel 12:30 p.m. – 1:15 p.m. and Palmetto Youth Center 1:30 p.m. – 2:30 p.m.
- Bus #2 Locations: Southeast High School 11:30 a.m. – 12 p.m., Manatee Mobile Home Park 12:30 p.m. – 1:15 p.m. and Freedom Elementary School/Haile Middle School 1:30 p.m. – 2:30 p.m.
- Bus #3 Locations: Lee Middle School 11:30 a.m. – 12 p.m., Daughtrey Elementary School 12:30 p.m. – 1:15 p.m. and Ballard Elementary School 1:30 p.m. – 2:30 p.m.
- There will also be two drive-up/walk-up locations at Buffalo Creek Middle School from 11:30 a.m. – 1:30 p.m. and King Middle School from 11:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.
For more information you can visit Manatee Schools Food website here.