WESTFIELD – The School Committee voted last night to charge students more for school meals to meet federal requirements for reimbursement.
Supervisor of Cafeterias Susan Pretola said the federal regulations “mandate us to increase the price to be equal to the reimbursement.”
The Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act (HHFKA) of 2010 mandates that cost of school lunch be gradually increased until the selling cost equals that of the federal reimbursement rate for free school lunches.
The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) sets that free lunch reimbursement rate based on a combination of inflationary factors for food. The rate, which is what the USDA reimburses to school districts for students who qualify for free and reduced cost lunch programs, was $2.51 at the end of last year and is expected to be adjusted upward this academic year by about six cents.
The purpose of the HHFKA law is to improve the nutritional value of meals provided to students as part of the national effort to reduce childhood obesity.
The purpose of this mandate is to enable schools to offer an enhanced meal program with increased portion sizes and increased frequency of fruits and vegetables, mandated types of vegetables, more whole-grain breads and pastas, servings of low-fat dairy products and increasing the focus on reducing the amounts of saturated fat, trans fats and sodium in food served to students.
Pretola said that students are qualified for participation in the federal free lunch program based upon family income and that the district “is getting more free lunch funding this year” than in the past.
The School Committee voted to increase the cost of lunch by 10 cents per meal and the cost of breakfast by 25 cents. Pretola said that the district serves breakfast to between a 1,000 and 1,200 students a day and hopes to further increase that number by offering alternative fare to what is currently served.
The price hike will increase breakfast from 75 cents to $1 and will increase the price of lunch in elementary schools to $2.20, while lunch for students in the districts four secondary schools will rise to $2.35.
Committeewoman Diane Mayhew said the board approved similar price increases last year and that the board should anticipate similar price increases for several more years because the gap between what the district was charging students and the reimbursement from the federal government is still significant.
“We were aware that we would need incremental increases because we were $1.25 off the reimbursement numbers,” Mayhew said. “We’re still about 75 cents below every other district in the region.
Pretola said the students fees generate sufficient income for the lunch revolving account to operate the program for about six and a half weeks which is a buffer recommended by the USDA. The federal agency recommends that districts have sufficient funding in their revolving accounts to operate for between four to 10 weeks. Westfield, which served 525,000 lunches last year, had an eight week reserve last year.
