Anti-hunger advocates afraid of school year’s end, when free meals for many Ohio kids

COLUMBUS, Ohio — At the beginning of the pandemic, the U.S. Department of Agriculture eased rules around the school breakfast and lunch program, allowing all students to get free food while eliminating requirements that they eat together in a cafeteria.

But those rules are set to expire at the end of the current school year.

In its recent $1.5 trillion spending bill, Congress didn’t direct additional money to provide free food to all students nor continue the flexibilities about where and how meals were served.

Now Ohio anti-hunger advocates are trying to find money to keep feeding kids through the summer.

Before the pandemic, about 1 in 5 Ohio children, roughly 500,000, were considered food insecure.

That means they didn’t have enough nutrition to learn at school, or that in their home, an adult was sacrificing food to ensure the children had enough, said Judith Mobley, president and CEO of the Children’s Hunger Alliance, a nonprofit that assists with providing the School Lunch Program at many non-school sites, such as child-care and recreation centers and after-school programs.

At the height of the pandemic, 1 in 4 children was considered food insecure, or about 700,000. It’s hard to say how many children are food insecure today because of a lag in the data, Mobley said.

Advocates note that the stronger economy and lower unemployment rate could indicate more parents are working.

However, inflation in food and gas prices means their dollars have less spending power, Mobley said. If families only had to feed their children once or twice a day during the last two years, they may struggle to pay for the family’s groceries once they have to buy all three meals.

Many children will qualify for free and reduced lunch once the school year is over under the USDA’s family income requirements lifted during the last two years.

But during the summer, they don’t get that food unless they can get to their school or if they participate in a program that serves it, such as a Boys & Girls Club. Mobley said that not all parents sign kids up for those programs, and many will go hungry.

The Children’s Hunger Alliance wants to keep sites that serve grab-and-go meals going through the summer.

Grab-and-go meals usually are not allowed in the National School Lunch Program because of a rule that children must eat in congregate settings, such as cafeterias.

These sites also have provided children bags containing several days of meals at once – also an exception to the normal rules that go away at the end of the school year. But offering many days of meals at once has been a convenience for families in rural areas who can’t get to a food site each day or for families without reliable transportation.

“We’ve estimated we probably need about $250,000,” Mobley said. “We’ve got a short window.”

Nutrition

The federal government requires breakfasts and lunches to have protein, grains, dairy, vegetables and fruits, with varying ounce requirements in each food group.

At the beginning of the pandemic, schools closed to avoid the spread of the coronavirus. Food distribution began to expand to libraries, community centers and public parks that didn’t have commercial ovens or refrigeration. The USDA offered flexibility in its standard rules to allow food programs to serve shelf-staple items, such as a meat stick or a fruit cup.

Now the majority of the places in Ohio that offer free food are non-congregate, grab-and-go meal distribution sites, such as the Heights Libraries in Cleveland Heights-University Heights. In fact, 70% of the Ohio sites in the National School Lunch Program distribute food in ways that will violate the USDA’s rules at the end of the school year.

“And that probably goes away unless we figure out a way to give them the meals using other funding,” Mobley said. “Federal nutrition funding does not work.”

The Heights Libraries has distributed 350 Grab-and-Go meals in the past year.

“At the end of the school year, we will pause our official meal service program and take some time to assess our options,” said Hillary Brown, a youth services librarian. “Our Friends of the Library group provided funds that we will use to purchase snacks to offer throughout the summer.”

Legislative solution?

Mobley said some school food vendors went out of business during the pandemic after schools had sent students home to learn remotely. Others have increased their prices to keep up with inflation, which she said is understandable considering their business environment.

But some prices have increased to levels higher than the federal school lunch reimbursement rate, a new expense that will be difficult for many meal programs to afford.

State Rep. Jay Edwards, a Republican representing Athens, Meigs, Washington and Vinton counties — areas where child hunger was highlighted during Joe Burrow’s Heisman Trophy acceptance speech — has asked legislative staff to research whether Ohio can use the remaining American Rescue Plan Act to help summer food programs.

He said he’s awaiting a response. If food programs are a lawful way to spend the pandemic aid, he plans to sponsor a bill to provide money for them.

“These programs are great. The fact that the Congress didn’t renew them for another year, we’re really worried about that,” he said.

“Relief was needed, and I think it helped families extend their budgets that were affected by job loss during the pandemic,” said Maureen Pisanick, a dietitian who owns a consulting business in the Cleveland area that helps schools plan menus that comply with the USDA guidelines. “We say hungry children can’t learn. When learning shifted to virtual learning from home, we knew as nutrition professionals in schools we needed to stand up for our role, which is hunger relief.”

During the pandemic, Pisanick tried to ensure that the grab-and-go lunches in the districts she worked with contained primarily fresh and healthy ingredients.

For instance, since they were providing several meals at once, some school districts could send students home with a head of lettuce, other ingredients, and a recipe card to make a family meal.

She partnered with the Pizza Bagel Lady in Fairview Park to create healthier pizza bagels by finding a local business that supplied whole-grain flour. Students were given fresh produce with the bagels. She said their meals looked similar to bistro boxes people purchase at Starbucks.

However, not every school district provided the quality of food as those that Pisanick worked with. Pisanick wasn’t as impressed with the processed items that some kids received, which is why the USDA generally doesn’t allow shelf-staple items. But she said that many meal providers couldn’t find food at the volumes needed to serve high numbers of children due to supply chain shortages.

“Moving out of the pandemic, I think there is some anxiety relative to supply chain,” she said. “But I really do just honor tenacity and the resilience of school professionals.”