Mountain State Spotlight – Jennifer Boyle-Hempel eats just once a day so she can save her limited food for her kids. She and her husband run an art studio in Elkins, but they are out of work because of the COVID-19 pandemic. At times, she hasn’t had enough food to feed everyone in her house, which includes three teenagers. Read full article here.
“I’m a mom. I can handle it,” she said. “But it’s different when you eat once a day because you’re tired. I know I have to save food for tomorrow because my daughter is going to be hungry.”
When Gov. Jim Justice mandated that schools close in March, schools and nonprofits jumped into action to make sure food was available to kids. School lots turned into drive-in feeding sites, bus drivers dropped off meal boxes to kids hidden in hollers, and the National Guard assisted in food handouts. State officials said they served a million meals to students in one month.
Then summer arrived, and the number of food sites shrank. School systems with tight budgets couldn’t sustain as many feeding programs or pay bus drivers to deliver meals to isolated communities. Many summer camps and in-person tutoring programs, which typically help feed kids in summer, never opened because of COVID-19.
