The School Nutrition Association and The School Superintendents Association penned a joint letter to the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry on Monday. Outlining major problems with the regulations imposed by Michelle Obama’s school lunch program.
Heavy regulations are costing more money than the govt is providing while at the same time demand is down.
That’s a bad combination that has cost schools $1.2 Billion dollars in 2015 alone.
The letter states:
According to USDA, the school meal regulations added 10 cents to the cost of preparing every lunch and 27 cents for every breakfast, forcing local school districts to absorb $1.2 billion in additional food and labor costs in FY 2015 alone. To meet the rules, schools were provided only 6 additional cents for lunch, and while every breakfast must include an extra serving of fruit, schools were given no additional funds.
Meanwhile, the US Government Accountability Office finds that “challenges with student acceptance” of the changes have contributed to 1.4 million fewer children choosing school lunch each day.
As you can see The School Nutrition Association and The School Superintendents Association understand the problem but have no clue how to fix it.
More from the letter:
No one in the debate over Child Nutrition Reauthorization is interested in reversing progress. To sustain the progress local schools have already achieved, Congress must provide adequate funding and flexibility so that school districts can successfully educate healthy, successful citizens.
Instead of recognizing that skyrocketing cost coupled with falling demand is unsustainable, they just ask for more money to throw at the problem. Just like a good govt agency.
