Boys &Girls Club Lihu‘e Clubhouse member Aiden Valera could not wait to start on his mini hula pie Friday during the final day of the Boys &Girls Club summer program.
“It’s his second birthday,” said Tina Albao, the Boys &Girls Club of Hawai‘i Kaua‘i director of operations and development. “He celebrated a birthday Tuesday. Today is his second treat.”
The treat was provided by the Boys &Girls Club as a surprise for its members at the four sites where the summer program was hosted — the West Kaua‘i, Lihu‘e and Kapa‘a clubhouses and the former Pier 1 store at Kukui Grove Marketplace.
“We are celebrating our last day of the summer program,” Albao said. “But we also want the members and their parents to know that with their new normal we can still celebrate our success.”
The celebration included the delivery of mini hula pies from Duke’s Canoe Club restaurant for the Lihu‘e Clubhouse and the Pier 1 site, a team from Wailua Shave Ice creating shave ice on location at the Kapa‘a Clubhouse, and the delivery of Super Duper 2 ice cream to the West Kaua‘i Clubhouse.
In addition to the celebration, Boys &Girls Club sent home a bag of rice for each member’s family.
“We have a storm to worry about,” Albao said. “We want to ensure that families have some food. The bag of rice for each family should help during this time.”
Albao said the Boys &Girls Club Kaua‘i spent the past four weeks re-engaging youth in education, fitness and health, the arts, building future leaders, and having fun — safely — together.
“We’re taking a week off before starting our fall program that will probably be an adaptation of the summer program to accommodate the alternating in-person school days that start from Aug. 4,” Albao said.
“The youth participants and their parents liked the summer scheduling, especially the convenient pickup times. We’ll adjust to an all-day schedule for parents whose children are involved with the alternate in-person classes.”
Albao said the summer program was successful due to the efforts of many.
“We want to thank our summer sponsors, the County of Kaua‘i-Kupa‘a Grant, No Kid Hungry Grant, and many other community partners,” said Albao. “A huge mahalo to Duke’s Kaua‘i, Keoki’s Paradise and Captain Andy’s also for feeding our kids throughout the summer.”
Derek Kessler, manager at Duke’s, said the restaurant not only provided lunches for the program, their associates collectively got together to prepare meals for the members’ families during the pandemic as well as came up with the mini hula pies on the final day of the summer program.
“We also did this for our employees at Duke’s and Keoki’s Paradise,” Kessler said. “We’ve prepared meals for them as well as coordinated a food distribution. This is just a little extra giving back. It is our honor and pleasure to be able and do this.”
