NEWPORT NEWS, Va. — When school is out for the summer, getting enough to eat can be a challenge for some kids. That’s where the Virginia Peninsula Foodbank's van comes in.
Tiffany Wynder and Shakeal Heard were staying busy using the van to serve free meals to kids during the summer.
“It’s been amazing," said Wynder.
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“It’s just a wholesome, good thing overall," Heard said.
They work for the Virginia Peninsula Foodbank in Hampton. Each weekday during the summer, they load up a van with food from the foodbank and head out to serve kids.
Twenty twenty six was the tenth year the foodbank has done this, but it's Wynder and Heard’s first year serving food.
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“A lot of kids, from what I’ve seen, they really count on this program. They come and they’re as happy to see us as we are to see them," said Wynder.
“It’s always different stuff on the menu. But today, beefaroni. We’ve got apple sauce, we always have a fresh fruit a bread, vegetables, milk. So you get a little bit of everything," Heard explained.
When News 3 interviewed them, they estimated they had served around 100 kids at the two locations they had been at during the summer. The locations vary from year to year across the peninsula.
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According to the foodbank, an estimated 61,000 people on the peninsula are food insecure, meaning they don’t know where they’ll get their next meal. About 24,000 of those are kids.
For Wynder serving up meals is also an opportunity to use the knowledge and skills she learned taking a culinary class the foodbank offers.
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“There was a lot of things that I picked up, a lot of educated things that I did not know that I now know, which is really good," said Wynder.
The last meals for the summer were scheduled to be served August 20.
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