It’s back to school this week for area students. For some, assurances that they’ll be getting a nourishing lunchtime meal, even if home finances can’t quite swing the cost, come with that. Here on the Boothbay peninsula, scores of youngsters have had access to free weekday lunches at two new sites this summer right here at home.

The USDA, which has worked with Healthy Lincoln County locally for four summers, was joined by new area sponsors, the Boothbay Region YMCA, the school district and Lincoln Health’s Coulombe Center for Health Improvement to add new lunch sites for the first time here in Boothbay.

Those enrolled at the Boothbay Region YMCA’s Camp Knickerbocker, which offers a wonderful outdoor summer experience for youngsters, have been treated to free breakfasts and lunches this summer. The camp provides a number of scholarships that enable low income families to enroll their children. The camp normally serves over 150 area youngsters weekly.

In addition, also for the first time ever, free lunches have been offered Monday through Friday at the Clifford Playground at Boothbay Center, in the covered picnic area. Children didn’t need to sign up, just show up any day when they wanted to get a healthy lunch, served by Dawn Murphy of the school cafeteria staff. We applaud the organizers for offering these lunches throughout the summer at a place where children  didn’t have to feel embarrassed to get a free lunch because it was a place they normally spend time, anyway, enjoying the swings, slides, ball fields and other recreational facilities.

We watched a TV segment on a loving, caring woman who delivered lunch bags daily to children in an area of the country where jobs were scarce and the people were having a hard time making ends meet. We couldn’t help but admire the effort, so it was with joy that we learned of the plans here on the peninsula to insure that our young people get a good lunch (and, in the case of Camp Knickerbocker, also breakfast) throughout the summer.

It never ceases to amaze us that many area residents don’t believe there are young people (and adults, too) who can’t manage to stretch their available money to insure that there’s always food on the table. Many years ago when townsfolk were considering closing the cafeteria in one of our old elementary schools because they needed more classroom space, some people believed there was no longer a need to serve cafeteria food, and that all students could simply bring a lunch from home. They were under the false impression that all  families could afford to send their children off to school each day with a bag lunch. Thankfully, taxpayers decided that the need for free and reduced cost school meals still existed then, just as it does today.

Kudos to those who have made the daily free lunches possible this summer. It’s another feather in the cap of this region, which continues to prove how much it cares about its residents.