Waltham Boys & Girls Club, Free Summer Lunch Program: When, Where

WALTHAM, MA — Each summer the Waltham Boys & Girls Club prepares and distributes free healthy lunches around Waltham for anyone 18 years old or younger.

The idea is to provide a safe space where young people no matter their family's income can find a nutritious meal. The program is open to any youth in the community regardless of whether they're a member of the club, or are rich or poor.

The Boys & Girls Club have been offering the program for more than 15 years, Director Erica Young told Patch in an interview. The program is a part of the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education food initiative together with Project Bread. It started out small, but after the Waltham Boys & Girls Club built their own kitchen in 2013, the program was able to grow, said Young.

Now it grows about 14 percent each year. To give you a sense of what that looks like, last Summer the group gave away some 15,000 meals.

"The whole point of the program is we don't track people. We don't want any stigma attached to it. So if you're under 18, you're eligible for the lunch no questions asked," said Young.

The goal this Summer is to serve about 18,000 meals.

The Boys & Girls club orders the food from the vendors and then a staff team of people who come in early in the morning and prepare the lunches, and then drivers and teen assistants set out on different routes throughout the community to take the free lunch to target areas you can find them at spray parks at the public pool, at playgrounds. Every meal includes whole grains, some kind of protein, fresh fruit or fresh vegetable as well as milk.

"We'll be at the park and parents who are there finding out about this for the first time will be like 'really this is free we don't have to do anything?' It's both shocking and a relief for them to have food be provided and you don't have to worry about a nutritious meal for your kids," said Young.

For many schools in Waltham, more than 52 percent qualify for free or reduced lunch. This effort started as a way to make sure students who are used to getting those free meals at school had one in the summer.

"But we really stress that this is a free nutritious meal for anyone," said Young. "Our biggest goal is to pull the stigma away and make it so that it's successful and accessible to every young person in Waltham. They're delicious meals, they're prepared with care and healthy, fresh and nutritious."

See the schedule of just when and where you can find a free meal for young people in the city:

File Photo of Waltham Boys & Girls Club by Jenna Fisher/Patch