Strengthening the Safety Net that Catches Kids Where They Live, Learn, and Play
Posted by Alice Pennington on Friday, April 9, 2010
The last stop on the recent Share Our Strength Hinges of Hope® tour in Houston was a visit to the Holthouse Boys and Girls Club, an agency of the Houston Food Bank, a Share Our Strength partner. Kids come to Holthouse after school to participate in sports, take computer classes, receive tutoring, and relax in the game room. They receive a meal every day in the Kids Cafe, which is run by the Houston Food Bank and funded through a Share Our Strength grant.
Walking around the club, you can tell that it’s a relaxing environment in which kids spend afternoons and evenings, but you don’t realize how dangerous the surrounding neighborhood is. When asked whether kids rode their bikes to the club from school, Lionese, the club’s director, suppressed an exasperated laugh and said, “This is NOT that type of neighborhood. These kids do not ride bikes!” She then explained that her club is the only club in the city that gives kids rides home when the club closes at 8 pm because there are too many sexual predators and there is too much crime in the neighborhood for the kids to walk home alone safely.
Holthouse, like the Small Steps Nurturing Center we visited earlier in the day, is a safe harbor for kids who face the realities of poverty way too early in their young lives. Leaders like Lionese at Holthouse and Evan at Small Steps know how poverty affects Houston’s kids and have done everything within their power to make sure their kids have a place to go for safety and support. Both Lionese and Evan told us how critical nutrition is to the emotional and physical development of their kids.
At all of the stops along the Houston Hinges of Hope tour, we talked to leaders and volunteers working to provide Houston’s children with meals they can rely on, day in and day out. We helped deliver meals to kids under age 5 with Kids’ Meals, Inc.; learned about Houston’s groundbreaking in-classroom breakfast program; and shared lunch with kids at Small Steps. We learned about the Houston Food Bank and Target Hunger’s innovative emergency food programs and witnessed a Kids Cafe program in action at Holthouse.
In Houston, a web of interconnected programs ensures that kids do not miss meals. This same web of programs is catching kids all across the country, and I couldn’t help but feel profound respect for the community leaders who make this happen. I also felt proud to be part of an organization that supports this safety net in towns and cities across the country by connecting those on the ground fighting hunger with the critical resources they need to make sure no child grows up hungry.
April 9, 2010 | 0 comment(s) | Tags: childhood hunger, grantees, Hinges of Hope, poverty
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