Free lunches have few takers during coronavirus school closures: “We need our babies to eat."

School lunch handouts

Michael Maclin, a security officer with the Cleveland school district. hands out lunches to students at Marion Sterling elementary school Friday in the Central neighborhood.Patrick O'Donnell/The Plain Dealer

CLEVELAND, Ohio – “Good morning y’all,” Michael Maclin calls out as a group of children crowd into an entryway of Cleveland’s Marion Sterling elementary School. “How can I help you?”

As students approach his table, the school security officer hands them brown paper bags and a larger clear bag, each filled with pre-packaged and sealed food items like juice, sandwiches and heatable pasta meals.

“Now, you get yours,” he says, handing over a bag. “Now, you’re going to get yours.”

But the initial crush of four kids in the entryway is over in just a moment. Then there’s a pause before the next person walks up to the school in the Central neighborhood for their free lunch. There’s no rush or lines, just a steady trickle.

“It’s light here,” said Kisha Berry, who volunteers to help provide food for students. She’s worried that without having school lunch every day, many kids are going without.

“We need our babies to eat,” she said. “That’s what I know.”

For the last two weeks of Ohio’s coronavirus school shutdown, school district employees have been passing out free lunches at 22 schools every weekday to anyone under 18 who wants one. Everyone also receives a free breakfast for the next day.

But few are taking advantage. Chris Burkhardt, who runs the school lunch program for the district, estimated that maybe 3,500 lunches, maybe a few more, were picked up Thursday. In a district of 38,000 students, that’s about 10% of students picking up the free meals, even as the district has one of the highest child poverty rates in the country.

So many students qualify for free or reduced-price school lunches that the district serves free lunch and breakfast to every student during normal school days.

Burkhardt notes that demand this week is higher than the start of last week, when families were picking up 1,200 per day across the entire district.

“We’re growing steadily every day,” said Burkhardt, who said other cities are seeing similar demand. “We’ve almost tripled what we were doing since we started.”

He’s not sure why, after all the worries that students would be left without food, more families are not coming.

“I think families loaded up a little bit when they found there’d be a shelter-in-place order,” he guessed.

That’s what happened with Jackie Rivera, who has two daughters at Marion Sterling and came to pick up lunches for the first time on Friday.

“I had enough supplies,” said Rivera, who expected to be back often now.

The district’s meal policies might be a factor. Cleveland gives out one lunch and breakfast per day, but some other districts, like Parma, give out a week’s worth of meals three days a week. East Cleveland offers daily pickup or a week’s worth of food every Monday.

“I’m not ruling that out as an option, but right now we’re doing pretty well,” Burkhardt said.

He noted that parents can come alone and receive meals for their children. Though many bring their children, they don’t have to.

The Breakthrough charter school network in the city is also seeing low demand for meals. John Zitzner, one of Breakthrough’s founders, said about 20% of families or fewer are picking up meals at all of Breakthrough’s schools daily. He said he’s considering giving meals just three days a week, but letting students take a few days’ worth of food at a time.

Rivera said she’d prefer picking up a week’s worth of groceries at once.

“I wouldn’t have to leave my house as often,” she said.

But Demetruia Williams, mother of the four kids Maclin was serving, said she has been coming daily and appreciates the meals.

“My kids, they love it,” she said. “Those little bags, they snack on them for four or five hours.”

Friday’s meal pickups now include a bonus. The Greater Cleveland Food Bank has a program to give backpacks of food to kids for the weekend. But the Boys and Girls Clubs, a major partner, has been closed, so the Food Bank is providing weekend packets at the district meal sites for now.

“When the kids come on Friday to get their food, they’ll get an additional batch of food that can get them through the weekend,” said Food Bank spokesperson Karen Pozna. Those were the clear bags Maclin handed out.

Weekend meal bags

Here's one of the bags of weekend meals the Greater Cleveland Food Bank is giving kids at 22 Cleveland school district schools during Ohio's coronavirus school shutdown.Patrick O'Donnell/The Plain Dealer

She’s not sure, either, why demand at schools would be low. A drive-through giveaway the Food Bank held this week was swamped and ran out of food.

But outside Marion Sterling, Berry suggested that parents who aren’t working need to bring neighbors’ kids to get food. She urged people to pull together to help the community.

“I am not scared of the coronavirus,” she said. “These kids need to eat. I’m not being paid. I’m a volunteer. But I’ll be here every day.”

Here are the district meal locations, plus details on how to take a bus from other district schools to pick up meals:

If you purchase a product or register for an account through a link on our site, we may receive compensation. By using this site, you consent to our User Agreement and agree that your clicks, interactions, and personal information may be collected, recorded, and/or stored by us and social media and other third-party partners in accordance with our Privacy Policy.