This summer, the Pi\u00f1on Project is offering free lunches for children ages 1 to 18 at the Dolores Library.<\/p>\n
No sign-up is required \u2013 just show up at the library on weekdays from 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.<\/p>\n
The free lunch program addresses child nutrition needs in an area of low income, said Dave Hart, health program director for Pi\u00f1on.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur goal is to improve child nutrition and cut child obesity, which food scarcity actually contributes to,\u201d Hart said.<\/p>\n
The program is funded in part by a grant from the Colorado Health Foundations.<\/p>\n
Dolores is considered a low-income community because 50 percent of students at Dolores Schools qualify for free and reduced lunches.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat number keeps rising due to high unemployment in the area,\u201d said Dolores School Superintendent Scott Cooper.<\/p>\n
The lunches are provided by Care and Share, a food bank for southern Colorado. The organization estimates that there are 4,130 individuals in Montezuma County with food insecurity, or 16 percent of the population of 25,500.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe know more kids could use it, so we are trying to get the word out,\u201d Hart said. \u201cAll children are eligible.\u201d<\/p>\n
Twenty to 30 lunches are served per day, with more during library events and classes for children.<\/p>\n
Last year, Dolores School offered a food backpack program that sent food home with needy kids over the weekend.<\/p>\n
The free lunch program targeted the Cortez community last year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Library hosts program at noon daily<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6363],"tags":[188,13],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-111204","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ds-news","tag-dolores-star","tag-frontpage-lead"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111204","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=111204"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111204\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=111204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=111204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=111204"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=111204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}