Community Lifeline Center adds healthy options to food program

Big things come in small packages.

Or, in the case of residents in need, they come in bags. And those "things" are a day's worth of meals.

The Community Lifeline Center (CLC), a nonprofit that helps northern Collin County residents in a short-term crisis back to self-sufficiency, has stepped up its 3 Meals-in-a-Bag program to provide recipients an ensemble of eat-smart choices.

"When people are struggling and have to cut back, one of the things they cut back on is healthy eating, then they put on weight, they're not feeling well, and stress levels have just taken a toll on their body," said Christine Hockin-Boyd, the center's executive director. "We offer something quick and easy to help them be more functional."

Function comes through easy-to-prepare meals -- one each for breakfast, lunch and dinner -- along with a cookbook of other nutritional, inexpensive home menu options. Individuals, families, churches and businesses assemble them, CLC distributes them.

The program began about two years ago, as a way to compliment area food pantries, some of which are open only a couple hours a day, Hockin-Boyd said.

The recipe books and healthy choices are fairly new additions.

What used to be mostly giveaway canned goods -- just pieces of a meal -- has become two to three breakfast items bagged with two of eight different lunch and dinner options.

With constant outside prodding from interested donors on how they could help, Hockin-Boyd turned to CLC partner, Texas AgriLife Extension, to develop a more eater-friendly menu, a sort of one-stop shop for hungry residents in an unforeseen pinch.

County extension agent Carrie Brazeal, whose crew already teaches classes on healthy living, parenting and budgeting at the center, designed options that could ensure recipients "don't always feel like they're eating peanut butter-and-jelly sandwiches, Ramen noodles and cereal," Hockin-Boyd said.

"It's not what they're expecting," she said of the revamped Meals-in-a-Bag. "When funding is short, you buy the cheapest things that can stretch, so giving them that bag with a variety, ready to go, is almost as if we just gave them a gift card to a nice restaurant."

As with other CLC services, the bags are for residents in a crisis -- laid off, weighed down by unexpected medical bills -- who have lived in the area for at least 90 days. If qualified, they can get a bag from CLC and be set for the day.

Bags include a few breakfast items, like granola bars, cereals, shelf-stable milk, even pancake mix, and lunch and dinner meals such as canned ham, instant potatoes, green beans, carrots and fruit. Also in the bags is AgriLife Extension's "Quick and Easy Recipes," a list of recipes for meals like "Best Ever Meatloaf" and "Texas Hash."

Other meals feature roast beef with gravy, spaghetti, chili, chicken and rice, vegetable soup and tuna casserole. Every option contains a core item and vegetable and fruit sides.

Donors can spend less than $20 and healthily feed a four-person family for a day.

"Part of our nutritional program offering includes smart shopping strategies, stretching a food budget and getting more bang for your grocery buck", said Megan Hickman, CLC case manager. "So your donation of 3 Meals-in-a-Bag not only helps feed a family physically, it also gives us the opportunity to educate our clients toward self-sufficiency -- always our goal at CLC. Teaching them to fish, instead of giving them fish. We do not continue to assist clients time after time, making your donation much more valuable than a bag of groceries."

And as is the annual trend, the need is at its highest in summer months, when school cafeterias can't help struggling parents provide for their children. The CLC lobby has been "non-stop busy" with potential clients in recent days, Hockin-Boyd said.

"Kids are out of school, they eat more I think; they're home, so it's 3 meals a day," said Delphia Adeogun, CLC case manager. "Mom and dad have to supply all of it."

The center gives away 15 to 20 bags a week during the summer, an increase recently aided by Trinity Presbyterian and First Baptist children in McKinney, who last week supplied CLC with 66 meal bags. Their donation could last at least three weeks, almost until school starts in August, Hockin-Boyd said.

"Right now, it's been very high," she said. "In 2008, when the economy went south, everyone was suffering and numbers were escalating. In 2010, things began to level off a little bit, but the demand is still very much there."

The on-site packages don't look like much from afar -- small, neon gift bags with ingredients popping out -- but they're more than enough for those in dire need.

They're as big as they come for some.

"If an individual's coming in asking for food only, that's just an indication that there's something else going on in their life," Hockin-Boyd said. "It doesn't take much to help people."

Interested donors should purchase a re-useable bag at the grocery store and bring it and selected items to CLC at 503 N. Kentucky St. in downtown McKinney, between 8:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Monday through Thursday. For more information, call 972-542-0020, or visit www.communitylifeline.org.

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