Each weeknight, close to a hundred kids get their dinner at the Mountain View Community Center in Anchorage.
But that could end after next week, sending a group of parents and volunteers scrambling to secure enough food and supplies to keep feeding neighborhood children through May.
Though the building is owned by the Municipality of Anchorage, since 1998 it’s been operated by Boys & Girls Clubs of Southcentral Alaska. After growing financial problems forced the organization to reduce services at the center, earlier this year a deal was reached to transfer management to the city’s Parks and Recreation Department on June 1.
But ahead of that date, parents received an email telling them that the center’s nightly dinner service, provided free to members 17 years old and under, was shutting down a month early.
“That was news to parents and the staff and the community members. We were all under the impression it was going to be business as usual,” said Jasmin Smith, a Mountain View business owner and community council vice chair, whose kids use the center. “We thought we were good through the month.”
The facility in Mountain View is not the only one that’s set to see the change.
“This is organization wide,” said Andy Mergens, chief operations officer for Boys & Girls Clubs of Southcentral Alaska.
The nonprofit has long participated in the Child and Adult Care Food Program, which involves filing for reimbursement with the state of Alaska. The program is paid for through federal dollars from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Amid inflation, rising labor costs and other factors, Mergens said, the organization recently discovered it was spending tens of thousands of dollars more each month on delivering Child and Adult Care Food Program services at its centers than it was getting back from the program.
“The reimbursement rate just doesn’t match what the expenses cost,” Mergens said.
On May 2, meal service is ending at five of the organization’s facilities: one in the Matanuska-Susitna Borough, one in Fairbanks and three in Anchorage, including its centers in Muldoon, Spenard and Mountain View.
Mergens said there will still be some food provided at all of the affected locations, but not the full-service, balanced meals prepared by paid employees.
“I can’t afford to keep the cooks. If I don’t have funding, I can’t keep food service staff on hand,” he said.
This week, Smith took to social media with a Facebook post asking for help so that the Mountain View Community Center can keep providing meal service each night to kids who may not have many other places to get food.
“Some kids don’t have anybody at home to cook for them,” Smith said.
She and other volunteers are holding a drive to collect food and other supplies Friday evening and midday Saturday. Smith said they are especially hoping to get specific ingredients and gift cards to local grocery stores because it allows the community center to buy the foods they need for the menu that was already prepared for meals during May. And, she said, because it simplifies accounting when it comes to spending donated funds.
“Handling cash and money is a little bit more tricky than someone saying, ‘Tell me what groceries you need,’” Smith said. “We just figured, to keep it clean … it was easier to just say, ‘If you can: give gift cards, give actual food items.’”
The volunteers do, however, hope to collect some money in order to pay laid-off kitchen staff for their work cooking and serving the meals, Smith said. Anything raised and collected beyond what they need to continue providing meal service will be rolled over into June, when the municipality is set to take over the facility. Smith said that while the city has so far been a great partner to work with during the facility’s transition in operators, the details and status of things like nightly dinners once they take over are not entirely clear.
“Plans for future programs and services are still being developed,” reads a city website with information on the center’s transition. “Anchorage Parks and Recreation is committed to providing safe, accessible, and engaging opportunities for the Mountain View community.”
Making dinner for dozens of youths each night happens year-round at the community center. But after classes let out in mid-May for Anchorage School District students, the facility provides lunch to kids, too.
Connor Kimbrell grew up in Mountain View, and now helps out with the evening food service. He said on a given night he and other volunteers will serve dinner to between 75 and 100 kids. One of the things that’s core to the neighborhood and community’s identity, he said, is people coming together to help one another out when there’s a need.
“It’s something that we’ve always done up here,” Kimbrell said.
The volunteer food and gift card drive is happening at the Mountain View Community Center on Price Street on Friday, April 25, from 5 to 8 p.m. and on Saturday, April 26, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.