Kids’ Food Basket has been providing meals to Muskegon area school children for the past 13 years from a church basement and a coffee shop. Its new headquarters is a former event center on Barclay Street.
“It’s got some land. There’s six acres here, so we can do a lot of agricultural work outside.”
That’s Kids’ Food Basket President and Founding CEO Bridget Clark Whitney.
“But also, just given the cost of inflation right now and the cost of construction, to be able to move into a building that doesn’t need full renovation is such a gift.”
One addressing a growing need. Right now, 62% of the total Muskegon student population qualify as economically disadvantaged and, of those, only 12.6% receive take-home dinners.
“Families are experiencing more and more difficulty in the grocery store obtaining and accessing healthy food, right? Everyone’s experiencing that and as the cost of healthy food continues to rise, the access to healthy food is less.”
KFB paid $1.3 million for the building but still has a fundraising goal of $3.7 million to complete the project. The facility is slated to be fully operational by this summer.
