Statewide fund increased to $375,000 to help kids get meals during COVID crisis
PORTLAND — Full Plates Full Potential, the Maine-based nonprofit working to end child hunger statewide, announced a new contribution of $25,000 from Central Maine Power aimed at increasing Full Plates’ Winter School Meals Fund. With this new investment, Full Plates expects to award $375,000 to schools and community organizations across the state, providing them with much needed resources during this challenging time.
“The ongoing pandemic has caused myriad logistical challenges for child nutrition programs across the state, all of which come with increased costs to programs that were already stretched financially thin before the pandemic,” said Senior Program Officer Jenn So. “Nutrition programs have needed to be creative and nimble as they’ve continued to feed Maine children in this volatile landscape of hybrid and remote learning dictated by shifts in COVID cases. The need for resources like additional staffing, packaging for meals, and equipment have been tremendous since March 2020. Each one of Full Plates’ previous 3 emergency meals funds have been maxed out.”
“When we saw the announcement of the Winter School Meals Fund, we immediately reached out to Full Plates to see how we could help,” said CMP Executive Chairman David Flanagan. “Given all the challenges facing our schools right now, we knew we had to step up and ensure that more students would be able to receive this critical support.”
The Full Plates Full Potential Winter School Meals Fund is part of Full Plates’ pandemic response. Awards of up to $5,000 will be given to schools or community organizations operating federally funded Child Nutrition Programs with grants helping to pay for transportation costs and safe packaging for breakfast and lunch meals. Since the beginning of the pandemic, Full Plates has awarded more than $1 million in emergency funding to schools and community organizations.
“CMP recognized the tremendous need we are seeing right now and stepped up to the plate,” said Justin Strasburger, executive director at Full Plates Full Potential. “This additional investment will allow us to support an additional 5-8 schools and community organizations, helping to ensure that more kids have reliable access to meals.”