Gleaners Food Bank of Indiana and Chartwells School Dining Services Provide Free, Healthy Summer Meals to Fayette County Children

INDIANAPOLIS, May 29, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- During summer months when school is out, thousands of children across the country are at-risk of missing meals and going without the nutrition they need when they can no longer rely on school food programs. Nowhere in Indiana is the issue more prevalent than Fayette County where nearly 30 percent of children are food insecure – lacking the availability and access to food.¹ To help provide students with wholesome foods during summer break when they don't have access to well-balanced school meals, Gleaners Food Bank of Indiana is partnering with Chartwells School Dining Services to launch the Spartan Summer Food Truck Program. For the third consecutive year, the program will provide free lunches to the youth of Fayette County all summer long.

The Spartan Summer Food Truck Program will kick off on May 29, 2014 with a mobile pantry event at Roberts Park from 3 – 5 pm. Community members in need of food assistance can stop by to receive grocery items at no cost. Following the launch event, the Spartan Summer Food Truck Program will make six daily stops, Monday – Friday, beginning May 29 through August 1, 2014. The program will be closed on Friday, July 4.

This year, the Spartan Summer Food Truck Program is expanding efforts to reach more children in need and is adding Fayette County Public Library to the list of community partners. Following is a full list of community locations serving free meals.

• Fayette County Public Library
  828 N Grand Avenue
  Wednesdays, 2:30 – 3:45 pm
  
  
• The Haven @ Industrial Park
  1220 North Illinois Avenue
  Monday-Friday, 1:30 – 2 pm
  
  
• Roberts Park
  2900 North Park Road
  Monday-Friday, 3 – 3:30 pm
  
  
• Offuts Park
  S. Co Rd. 350 West off of 44E
  Monday-Friday, 3:35 – 3:50 pm
  
  
• Elephant Hill Mobile Home Park
  1000 West 21^st St.
  Monday-Friday, 4 – 4:20 pm
  
  
• Frazee Community Center
  901 Meyer Avenue
  Monday-Friday, 4:30 – 4:45 pm
  
  
• Pleasant View Apartments
  32^nd St. & Virginia Avenue
  Monday-Friday, 5 – 5:20 pm

"School meals are the main source of nutrition for many children and it's important we fill that nutritional gap when school is not in session because hunger doesn't take summer vacation," said Cindy Hubert, president and CEO of Gleaners. "Gleaners is proud to partner with Chartwells and the Fayette County School System to bring back The Spartan Summer Food Truck Program for a third year and continue to deliver wholesome meals kids need."

About Chartwells School Dining Services
Chartwells, a division of Charlotte, NC-based Compass Group, provides dining services for over 575 public school districts and private schools, comprising of approximately 4,000 separate elementary, middle and high schools nationwide.  For more information about Chartwells School Dining Services, visit www.eatlearnlive.com and follow us on Facebook and Twitter.  

About Gleaners Food Bank of Indiana, Inc
On a yearly basis, hundreds of thousands of hungry Hoosiers depend on food and other critical grocery products provided by Gleaners Food Bank of Indiana. Gleaners supplies items to hunger relief agencies and schools throughout 21 counties in central and southeast Indiana. Gleaners was founded in 1980 and is a member of Feeding America the nation's food bank network.  Since its inception, Gleaners has distributed over 320 million pounds of food and critical grocery products to over 200 hunger relief agencies serving needy Hoosiers.  In addition to food distribution to hunger relief agencies, Gleaners serves our most vulnerable populations, seniors and children, through specialty programs such as the Commodity Supplemental Food (CSFP) Program, BackSacks: Weekend Food for Kids, School-Based Food Pantries, and the Summer Meals for Kids Program.  In Gleaners' 21-county service area, more than 287,000 struggle with hunger and food insecurity—and 107,000 of them are children.  To learn more, log onto www.gleaners.org.

¹ Map the Meal Gap 2014, Feeding America

SOURCE Chartwells School Dining Services