Food pantries, lunch programs help fill summertime meal gaps

METRO DETROIT — As the school year ends and the second year of the Michigan School Meals program nears completion, C & G Newspapers looked across metro Detroit to see what food programs are available to bridge the food insecurity gap during the summer.

The Michigan School Meals program provides free breakfasts and lunches to all students from pre-K to 12th grade during the school year, according to the Michigan Department of Education’s website. Without this program, what will students do for meals?

Among the programs that fill this void are the United Way for Southeastern Michigan’s Meet Up and Eat Up, several programs at Forgotten Harvest, and local food pantries, including one offered through Heritage Church, in Sterling Heights.

Meet Up and Eat Up
Meet Up and Eat Up is a food program offered throughout the state. It provides free meals for children 18 and younger or anyone with a disability 26 and under, according to Madelyne Wright, assistant director of nutrition services for the Oakland Livingston Human Service Agency, which facilitates the program in Pontiac.

The program does not mandate enrollment, specific documentation, or eligibility requirements.

“This eliminates the burden of administrative paperwork,” said Wright.

The idea is to begin the Meet Up and Eat Up program as soon as the kids are out of school.

“So the kids don’t have any gaps in nutritional support,” Wright said.

This year, the Meet Up and Eat Up program through OLHSA is slated to begin June 16. Food trucks will visit apartment complexes, schools and day camps.

The need keeps growing in the community, according to Wright.

“We keep breaking records,” she said. “Last summer, 2024, we served about 50,000 meals between mid-June until late-August. The summer before that (2023), we served 40,000 meals.”

“We get a massive turnout for food,” Wright added.

Meet Up and Eat Up works to meet the demands of the community.

“If we go to a mobile site and there are 100 people waiting for food and the vendor only made 50 meals, we’ll come back and serve the rest of the 50 people,” Wright said. “We always make sure to serve everyone.”

Meet Up and Eat Up programs are offered in other communities throughout Oakland, Macomb and Wayne counties. For a detailed list of locations go to unitedwaysem.org/resources/meet-up-and-eat-up.

For volunteer opportunities at Meet Up and Eat Up in Pontiac, call (947) 957-4599.

 

Forgotten Harvest
In 2024, Forgotten Harvest fed 474,637 children, according to Christopher Ivey, marketing and communications director for the nonprofit. As of mid-May, it had fed 358,682 children so far in 2025.

If the trajectory continues, this year’s numbers will surpass last year’s numbers.

The need is increasing, according to Ivey.

“All of the food we rescue is distributed free of charge without any real questions asked,” Ivey said.

They only ask generic questions for the purpose of analytics to determine the organization’s impact on the community, according to Ivey. Those questions include where the persons served live, where they are coming from and the makeup of their household — children, adults and seniors.

The summer programs include a youth snack program distributed through the Detroit Public Library. There are 12-15 summer pantries that still run throughout the schools and mobile distribution.

“So if the family is in need of food, they can still go back to a location that is familiar to them,” Ivey said.

With 40 pantry partners, Forgotten Harvest runs a subsidized summer lunch program in addition to the Forgotten Harvest Summer Lunch Program where they will do about 100,000 lunches communitywide, according to Ivey.  In addition, they are the lunch partners to Metro Youth Day on Belle Isle July 9 where they will do an additional 3,000 lunches.

The lunch programs start June 23 and go through Aug.  29.

Last year there were 29 sites where Forgotten Harvest distributed food throughout Wayne, Oakland and Macomb counties.

“We’re working to expand that list,” Ivey said. “Or at least working to confirm we have that many pantry partners again.”

Forgotten Harvest has a mobility market, which is a food pantry on wheels. It goes to various neighborhoods throughout Oakland, Wayne and Macomb counties. There is also a truck on their Oak Park Forgotten Harvest campus. Guests are allowed to go in and select what they want.

According to their website, the mobility markets are open Monday through Saturday except for holiday weekends.

For more information about their programs and a schedule of their mobility market, go to forgottenharvest.org/find-food/

 

Heritage Church
While most food pantries are not open on the weekend, the Heritage Church food pantry is only open on Saturdays.

Drivers pull up and are given a shopping list, where they check off items they want. Volunteers bag the groceries and deliver the groceries to the car.

Although anyone in need can come and get food assistance, they have a program for parents with special needs children.

“Because the child is challenged, they (their parents) are pulled out of their work and they can’t make ends meet,” said Candi James, the pantry manager. “We don’t know who they are, but we have it set up. We will bless them with whatever we have.”

Heritage Church is located at 44625 Schoenherr in Sterling Heights. The pantry is open Saturdays from 9:30 a.m. to 11:00 a.m.

The program started more than a decade ago and has grown as the needs of the community have grown.