Summer campers dressed in their uniforms lined up single file outside of the Lillian Jones Recreation Center's multipurpose room and waited to be served lunch by Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, as part of her City Worker for a Day initiative.
On Tuesday, Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake visited the recreation center and served more than 50 children boxed meals. Each box consisted of a bologna and turkey whole grain sandwich, carrot sticks with ranch, and either chocolate milk or apple juice.
While there, the mayor interacted with camp counselors, volunteers and dozens of animated campers, aged 5-14, who are benefiting from having free meals through the rec center's summer camp program.
"We're serving free summer meals, which is funded through the Housing Department of Baltimore City," Tracey Estep, chief of recreation center operations at Baltimore City Recreation and Parks said. "This gives her a first look of housing and recreation working together impacting the lives of our children."
To kick-off the City Worker for a Day initiative, the mayor joined crew members from the Department of Transportation to fix potholes last month. This month, Rawlings-Blake is focusing on childhood hunger in Baltimore.
"We know that during the school year our young people have access to free food, breakfast, lunch and dinner," Rawlings-Blake said. "There's a lot of food insecurity here in the summer month because school is out. …With our partnerships with Rec and Parks and Housing, we put together this very robust plan for distribution of free meals to make sure our kids are happy, safe and also healthy during the summer."
According to YouthWorks camp counselor, Kirin Burford, many children do not have access to three meals a day and he said he is fortunate to have the mayor show her support in the community.
"It's cool to have somebody so big come in and see what we do on a day-to-day basis," the 17-year-old said. "I feel like it's a good thing for her to come through and help feed the kids. This could be their only meal for the day."
mcollins@baltsun.com