2 Districts Sign Up for Free Meals for Youths : Schools: Ventura and Ocean View have applied to the federal project, which serves needy students over the summer.

Concerned that needy children are going hungry during the summer, the Ventura and Ocean View school districts have signed up for a federal program to serve free lunches to students while they are out of school.

But federal officials say many Ventura County students still go hungry because not enough local agencies have stepped up to run summer food programs.

The Santa Paula and Fillmore school districts, the Ventura County superintendent of schools’ migrant education program and California Lutheran University in Thousand Oaks already serve federally funded free lunches to 1,800 needy children each summer.

School officials in Ventura and the Ocean View district in Oxnard said they expect to provide meals to an additional 1,100 children, bringing the total in the county to about 2,900.

But federal officials say there are 36,674 school-age children who qualify during the school year for free or reduced-price lunches, which is the criteria for students to receive the summer meals.

That means that Ventura County is providing the free summer meals to only 7.9% of the children who are eligible, slightly trailing the statewide average of 8%.

“We need more school districts, we need more public and private agencies” willing to sponsor the food program, said Cleophus Davis, western regional director of the summer feeding program for the U. S. Department of Agriculture. “The same children who are eligible for free and reduced meals during the year are no less hungry when school is out.”

The Department of Agriculture launched the summer food program in the late 1960s as an extension of the federal free-and-reduced lunch program.

Although the federal government reimburses agencies $2.28 for each meal served, the program sponsors must operate efficiently enough not to spend more than they receive.

“With prudent management, you can break even,” Davis said.

Despite the promise of reimbursement, some county school districts with high numbers of needy children have never applied for the federal program.

In the Oxnard Elementary School District, for example, all but 1,500 of the 7,500 students who eat cafeteria lunches would qualify for free lunches in the summer.

Oxnard school officials said they have considered the program but are looking for local clubs or community sites where the meals could be served. In the Ventura Unified School District, the meals will be prepared at school cafeterias but served at community centers and Boys & Girls Clubs in areas with high numbers of needy families.

“Those areas that we’re serving, they’re all considered a high-need area,” said Edward Diaz, the district’s food services director. “If we don’t feed those kids a lunch, many of them will not get a lunch.”

The lunches will consist of the usual school fare.

On June 20, the first day of Ventura’s summer lunch program, the menu calls for pizza, fresh fruit, tossed salad and milk.

Although such nutritionally balanced meals may generate less excitement in children than, say, a trip to McDonald’s, Ventura school officials said they expect up to 1,000 children to take advantage of the free meals each day.

In Santa Paula, where the elementary school district launched the program just last summer, organizers said they served an average of 581 lunches per day. The county’s program for children of migrant workers feeds about 500 students daily during the summer.

The Fillmore Unified School District provides the free summer lunches to about 542 children each day. The Cal Lutheran Upward Bound program serves the meals to 40 students daily, and the Ocean View district estimates that it will provide lunches to about 90 students.

Even though the federal program is intended only for children from low-income families, students are not asked to present identification or proof that they qualify, organizers said. Only people who are clearly over 18 years of age are turned away.

Organizers of the Santa Paula summer lunch program said they refused meals to some homeless adults last summer. But school officials said they still served far more lunches each day than they had anticipated: On some days, nearly 800 children showed up for the free meals.

Many of the children come from homes where both parents work long hours to support their families, leaving the youngsters to fend for themselves during the day.

“We were really surprised at the turnout,” said Sandy Cortinas, assistant food services director for the Santa Paula Elementary School District. “A lot of these kids really needed a lunch.”

FYI

The Ventura Unified School District will begin providing free lunches June 20 at the following locations: Westpark Recreation Center, 450 W. Harrison St.; Cabrillo Village Community Center, in Cabrillo Village off of Saticoy Avenue; the Boys & Girls Club, 1440 N. Olive St., and the Boys & Girls Club, 1929 Johnson Drive. For information, call the district at 641-1500.