The Fuentes sisters of Warm Springs, recipients of the Every Kid Sports Pass, both enjoy playing basketball.

As many families struggle financially amid the COVID-19 pandemic, signing kids up for sports might not be a priority — especially when fees for youth programs can run $100 or more.

Every Kid Sports, a Central Oregon-based nonprofit, helps kids from low-income families pay the fees required to participate in youth sports. Though most sports are still on pause, they are scheduled to resume in the coming weeks and months and many kids will likely need financial help in order to take part.

“There’s so much more need now,” says Natalie Hummel, executive director of Every Kid Sports. “And even families that used to be able to cover their kids playing sports are in trouble now. It’s been wide-ranging, the amount of impact COVID has had on families. If you can’t get food on the table, you’re not going to be registering your child to play sports.”

The nonprofit was founded 11 years ago in Bend, and was formerly called Kids in the Game.

Every Kid Sports mostly aids youth in Central Oregon, but has recently expanded to help youngsters throughout the Pacific Northwest and nationally.

The Every Kid Sports Pass program approved more than 1,700 grants for kids in 2020 throughout the Pacific Northwest, according to Hummel. The goal, Hummel says, is to have it be available nationwide by September. Families can register discreetly online at everykidsports.org.

The nonprofit also was selected by T-Mobile to help administer its Little League Call Up Grant, which will provide funds for 20,000 kids to play baseball and softball. Every Kid Sports was also named as a “Champion” by the Aspen Institute and the National Youth Sports Strategy Council in 2019 for removing cost as a barrier to sports participation and for encouraging kids to play multiple sports.

Every Kids Sports’ association with the Little League Call Up Grant stems from discussions the nonprofit had with Major League Baseball about supporting Every Kid Sports, according to Hummel.

“Little League was struggling with how to implement (the Call Up Grant) and reach the kids,” Hummel says. “So they reached out to us and this is our second year. Last year we helped about 5,400 kids. And T-Mobile gave $2 million to help 20,000 kids total.”

Hummel says that due to the pandemic, “youth sports are being decimated. Thousands of small youth sports organizations have closed their doors. We just see that without some intervention and without somebody coming to help, those organizations will never be able to open their doors again and youth sports will be forever changed.”

Hummel hopes that Every Kid Sports can kickstart the registration process, which could help many of those smaller organizations open their doors.

“We’ve gotten a lot of response from corporate sponsors and other organizations that our model makes a lot of sense,” she says. “That’s what’s driving the push to take it national. And that’s always been our mission when we first started the nonprofit.”

While many winter youth sports programs have been canceled or postponed due to the pandemic, many baseball and softball leagues have continued, and some programs have found new ways to get kids outside.

“Obviously a lot of those youth sports programs are not happening right now, so we have slowed down in the number of grants we’ve been giving out,” Hummel says. “But there’s a lot of research that there wasn’t any outbreaks associated with baseball and softball, that’s why we’re seeing a lot of people registering with that (Call Up Grant) program.

“And there are a lot of innovative programs where families are getting outside, mountain biking and things like that.”

Every Kid Sports offers grants for youth all the way up to age 18. Most sports programs require fees, from recreation programs for elementary school children, to middle school and high school sports. The nonprofit helps with fees for these sports, but not for club sports or travel teams which are often year-round. Hummel says part of the goal is to encourage athletes to play multiple sports and not specialize at too young of an age.

“We believe kids get as much or more benefit from playing recreational sports, and going from sport to sport, versus the year-round sport,” she says. “So much of the current thinking of parents is that they need to get their kids into these competitive programs. But the research is overwhelming that those programs are actually more damaging to kids than beneficial. It’s not really until they’re 16, 17, 18 that they should be specializing in a sport.”

The average grant amount from Every Kid Sports is about $100 for one kid in one sport, Hummel adds.

“Right now we have plenty of funding,” she says. “And there’s more families than ever that need help.”