Youth food insecurity addressed at Central Kansas Hunger Summit

WICHITA, Kan. (KSNW) — Meals insecurity impacts greater than 30,000 youth in Sedgwick County. On the Central Kansas Starvation Summit held in Wichita on Thursday, neighborhood leaders appeared for options.

“Once I considered opening up the fitness center, I knew it was gonna take a sacrifice from my half,” Tracey Mason, Sr. stated.

Mason owns the CHD Boxing Membership. He stated most of the youth he sees day by day go with out meals.

“I don’t need that youth to go dwelling hungry, . They don’t have the vitality to be taught in class,” stated Mason.

He stated his sacrifice led to him skipping meals himself so he can ensure others eat.

“A variety of them don’t have the recent fruit, recent produce as a result of there’s a so-called quote, ‘meals desert.’ You understand, we don’t have grocery shops round in our neighborhoods,” Mason stated.

Kansas Appleseed hopes to do one thing about that. On the Central Kansas Starvation Summit, the difficulty of meals insecurity was addressed.

“We’re not going to eradicate starvation in the present day, however we will have the conversations that afterward the street, we will be sure that all Kansans have entry to meals,” Haley Kottler stated.

Kottler works with Kansas Appleseed and says she’s seen it first hand.

“The place I reside in Wichita, there are eight grocery shops within the sq. mile. However for those who go two miles west of me, there are zero grocery shops for miles and somebody who could already be dealing with meals insecurity, that’s an issue,” stated Kottler.

Till then, Mason stated he’ll preserve going.

“We’ll take the assistance of different organizations, akin to meals banks, issues like that, to have the ability to faucet in and simply let individuals which are hungry come get meals to eat,” Mason stated.