Celebrating our Champions in 2021!
Over the past several years, we have had the opportunity to partner with so many of you through the work of No Kid Hungry Louisiana. Each of you have amazed us with your creativity, commitment and passion to make sure our young people are provided healthy meals in schools and communities throughout the state.
This past year however has been a year of extraordinary challenges. 2021 not only had the uncertainty of COVID: a devastating hurricane impacted many communities, supply chain issues plagued daily operations of feeding kids and health and safety continued to be at risk. But through it all, child nutrition service providers continued to show up for our children, ensuring they had healthy snacks and meals before, during and after school. Because of you, our young people were able to have a sense of normalcy at a time when so many things seemed uncertain.
No Kid Hungry Louisiana is proud to have partnered with so many of you. This year we provided 42 grants totaling over $1.6 million to communities across our state. Among many moments of pride for our shared work, we saw:
- Governor John Bel Edwards and First Lady Edwards led the way in making sure Louisianans had resources and information about where to access meals and continued to make ending hunger a priority for their administration.
- Passage of legislation to ensure Pandemic EBT benefits to kids and families so they could have immediate access to resources to purchase food. We are especially grateful to the leadership of Representative Aimee Freeman for championing this bill.
- The heroic work of Feeding Louisiana’s network of food banks who responded to emergency food needs in communities impacted by hurricane Ida.
- The incredible child nutrition staff at schools who worked day after day to ensure kids had healthy meals at school or at home. Cafeteria staff partnered with their entire school communities to overcome any barrier in their way to reach children no matter where they were learning!
- The steadfast work of our state agencies in providing guidance to schools and community partners and serving as a critical resource during times of uncertainty.
This year has been about partnership, communication and collaboration. On behalf of the team at No Kid Hungry Louisiana, I say thank you for your hard work and diligence. I hope your holiday break is a time of relaxation and rejuvenation and that the New Year finds you in good health.
Happy Holidays
Rhonda M. Jackson
Director,
No Kid Hungry Louisiana