Owsley County Schools offers free summer meals for children through July 23
Free SUN Meals are available Tuesdays and Thursdays at Owsley County High School through July 23, giving children 18 and under a summer food stop families can plan around.
Owsley County Schools is keeping free meals flowing to children 18 and under at Owsley County High School through July 23, with pickup on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. at the OCHS Kitchen Door near the rear of the building across from the baseball field. Families can sign up in advance so food service staff can plan for the summer run, and the district says the school meal site is an equal opportunity provider.
The setup is built for working parents, grandparents and caregivers who need a dependable place to get food while school is out. The district’s June 11 live feed said SUN Meals pickup was happening that day and that it is never too late to sign up, a reminder that the program is meant to stay easy to use throughout the summer rather than function as a one-time event.
The need is clear in Owsley County’s own numbers. Census Bureau QuickFacts puts the county’s population at 4,051, with 23.3% under age 18, while 34.6% of residents were living in poverty in the 2020 to 2024 American Community Survey estimates. Median household income was $22,188 in the same estimate period. Feeding America’s Map the Meal Gap data shows Kentucky’s food insecurity rate was 16.6% in 2023, underscoring why a school-based meal stop can matter when cafeterias close for the summer.
Kentucky Department of Education officials say more than 2,000 sites statewide are serving meals to children this summer, placing Owsley County’s program inside a broader effort to stretch family food budgets during the school break. In Owsley County, the district said the first week of SUN Meals delivered more than 3,200 total meals and almost 1,000 books for children in the county, pairing lunch pickup with a summer reading and math boost effort.
For families in Booneville and across the county, the value is partly the location itself: Owsley County High School is a familiar campus, and the Kitchen Door pickup point gives the program a steady weekly rhythm. With Tuesday and Thursday service continuing through July 23, the district is using one of the county’s central institutions to keep children fed and households from carrying the full summer gap alone.
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