Barefoot children prompt Kids Café to expand efforts

How you can help To donate money to support Kids Café or to become a Kids Café volunteer, call Bea Hanson at 887-6291. To donate new or used clothing or shoes, call Juan Villarreal at 888-4223.

A handful of children showed up for free lunch wearing no shoes during the recent grand opening of Kids Café at an activity center on Mary Street.
   Bea Hanson, executive director of the Food Bank of Corpus Christi, was shocked to find out why.
   "I found out some of them share their shoes with siblings and it was their brother or sister's turn that day to wear the shoes," Hanson said.
   Although the Fighting to Rid Gangs in America Foundation activity center, 2121 Mary St., requires children to wear shoes to participate in its programs, needy children still show up shoeless, prompting the center's staff to seek out shoe donations to resolve these emergency cases.
   Center seeks shoes
   That got Hanson, foundation officials and the Nueces County Sheriff's Department, all of which collaborate on the Kids Café program, to go beyond the free summer breakfast program to meet yet another need among the children they serve.
   "I saw the need firsthand just (Tuesday) morning," said Cory Garza, prevention program coordinator with the foundation. "I got to the center at 7:30 and waiting for us to open up were two brothers, both not wearing shoes."
   The boys, 8 and 11, come from a family of eight and had come to the center early because they were hungry and wanted to be first in line, said Garza, who gave them juice cartons and snacks from the center's pantry.
   At 10 a.m. the boys were back to participate in center activities and again, Garza noted, the boys came shoeless.
   "The truth is, shoes aren't really an issue with them," Garza said. "They're hungry, and many don't have an A/C at home, and they're looking for someplace safe and cool to hang out during the summer."
   Not a new problem
   Juan Villarreal, the foundation's operations manager, said the problem they're now tackling isn't new. While many of the needy children his program serves do get a new pair of shoes from charitable organizations at the beginning of the school year, the children eventually wear them out or outgrow them, forcing them to do without during the summer.
   "Children go through shoes real fast, we all know that," Villarreal said. "But these kids come from low-income families."
   Some come from single-parent households; others have only one parent working for whatever reason. If rent, medicine and food are the pressing needs at home, Villarreal said, shoes go by the wayside.
   "Our (Kids Café) business is to ensure these kids get a balanced meal every day, but when you encounter these problems, you can't turn away," Hanson said. "We can't say we've fed them and therefore we've done our part. If we're going to involve ourselves in this kind of effort, we need to involve ourselves fully."