Hunter
09/09/25
The Healthy Kids Iowa program, which governor Kim Reynolds implemented instead of accepting a federal Summer EBT program, helped feed thousands of kids over the summer, but anti-hunger advocates said it was ineffective at reaching families who needed assistance.
Healthy Kids Iowa provided eligible families with $40 worth of food once a month over the summer. The Summer Electronic Benefit Transfer program would have provided a one-time $120 grocery benefit per eligible child for the summer.
Announcing the program in December, governor Reynolds said “Our goal has always been to ensure all Iowa children have access to nutritious, balanced, and wholesome food, while promoting healthy eating habits.”
Critics said the boxes of food didn’t give families much of a choice, and the program insinuated that families were incapable of making healthy food choices for their kids. There was also the issue of access, with families in rural areas needing to travel significant distances to receive their food allocations.
John Boller, head of the Coralville Food Pantry, said implementing the Healthy Kids program added more work to the already busy food pantries and other food access organizations. He told Iowa.Media, “We were tasked with this essentially impossible challenge of making sure this program was executed with zero heads up.” He also heard that families were having trouble planning around the distribution dates and the amount of food became overwhelming for people. Families received one box of food per eligible child, which led to storage problems that wouldn’t have happened if they were given EBT cards to purchase food at their own pace.