Here’s an informational sheet I received from District 150 on the first day of school:
A recent change in federal law allows Illinois, Kentucky and Tennessee school districts with a high poverty population to offer free meals to all students in the approved school. To be eligible and receive reimbursements from the government, a school district must have 40% or more families participating in Federal poverty programs for each school that is approved for the Community Eligibility Option (CEO). CEO is a pilot program for the three states listed above, and once a school is approved to participate, their participation is guaranteed by the Government for at least four years.
That’s right. Because fewer than half of families in a particular school need free or reduced price school lunches, the federal government has developed a program that gives everyone in the school free breakfast and lunch. In District 150, this means 22 out of 28 schools are participating — every school except Richwoods, Lindbergh, Washington Gifted, Kellar, Northmoor, and Charter Oak. So now, the first 15 minutes of the day at Whittier is spent serving kids free breakfast.
Obviously, I have no problem with a program that provides free and reduced price lunches to children in need. But under this program, up to 60% of families who are not at all in need will get free meals. Why? According to a USDA press release, “By streamlining the eligibility and enrollment process, no additional application is required to provide much need nutrition assistance to children in need.” Here’s how another press release expresses it:
“Community eligibility is a great way for schools to cut through burdensome red tape for themselves and low-income families so that children in high-poverty areas have access to the nutrition they need to learn and thrive,” said Agriculture Under Secretary Kevin Concannon. “Schools will benefit from reduced paperwork, parents will not have to fill out duplicative forms, and children in need will get better access to healthy school meals.”
In other words, those in need no longer have to fill out an application form (which the government considers “burdensome red tape”), and the school doesn’t have to process them. But who’s paying for all this convenience? Ultimately, the school district:
Under this option, schools utilize preexisting data to determine the amount of reimbursement they can claim from USDA. The determination is primarily based on the percentage of households in that community who are already participating in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), formerly known as the Food Stamp Program. Schools that utilize this option agree to provide meals to all children free of charge, and USDA reimburses them for the appropriate amount based on this preexisting data. Under this option, schools will still be responsible for paying the remaining difference between the Federal reimbursement amount and the total cost to operate the program. [emphasis added]
So, the federal government is only reimbursing school districts for those 40% or more students who are really in need. The up to 60% of other children that take advantage of the free breakfasts and lunches who are not in need will be paid for by the school district. This seems a high price to pay for eliminating an application form. On WCBU news this morning, it was reported that District 150 is facing a $2 million budget deficit this year.
UPDATE: I asked District 150 Comptroller/Treasurer David Kinney about the costs of this program to the district, and he had this to say:
Yes, we pay the difference [between the Federal reimbursement amount and the total cost to operate the program]. However, what is important is understanding what that “difference” is. With all formulas worked out, the feds will reimburse us 99.2% of the meals served. We are actually hopeful that we will be ahead with that formula for a couple of reasons. First we will be able to save a small amount in typical administrative costs. Second, we will NOT be in a situation with those eligible schools that we will be chasing down kids or families that haven’t paid for their lunches – which is the situation we have had in the past. What has often happened – and happens in many school districts, kids that are not “free” or “reduced” may spend their lunch money on something else and then charge their lunches – or parents didn’t have the money to give. When these charges accumulate, many school districts enact practices to try to collect those funds. For District 150, all those head aches will actually now go away. At a max of 8/10ths of one percent cost to implement this program, we project we will actually come out ahead.
We also think that with the ease of this program, we will serve more lunches and breakfasts to our kids, making for a better day for them.
He brings up another D150 policy that I find bizarre. One day my wife and I discovered that we owed D150 for milk our daughter had purchased on credit. We never gave her permission to buy milk, nor to have any kind of “credit” account. (We send an orange juice, which you can find at sites like https://orangina-na.com/, with her sack lunch, and would have given her milk money if she had asked for it — she never did.) But apparently at District 150, kids can put stuff on their parents’ tab without their parents’ knowledge. Then one day the parents get a surprise bill in the mail for it. It’s a strange economic system indeed that resolves collection problems by ceasing to charge for goods.
CJ sez: “…under this program, up to 60% of families who are not at all in need will get free meals.”
I sez: Usually you are spot on, CJ but on this one you just aren’t thinking. Of that 60%, how many parents were too lazy or proud or stupid to not fill out the paperwork? How many were close to qualifying but just missed qualifying?
You state that these 60% “are not at all in need” but I disagree. There are varying degrees of need.
School lunch is cheap – a little less than $2 a day. But for some folks that $10 per kid per week (not including breakfast) could make a huge, huge difference – even if they don’t quite qualify.
I can feed two kids on the weekends and in the evenings for $20 with groceries from Aldi and a little time at the stove.
In the end, what this does is catches a lot of kids that fall through the cracks. It goes right to the children and it affects their academic performance.
There are a lot of problems with our public schools – D150 more than most – but this isn’t one of them.
Mouse is right and to add that kids that do qualify don’t fill out the paper work. They are too lazy to submit the form which is a simple one page form. Then on Oct 1, the school has to refuse lunches for kids who didn’t get their paperwork in. This is a lot of the kids every year and they are shocked that they are turned down for lunch unless they pay. Of course this brings the angry parent in demanding to know why their child was refused lunch. I have seen this past years and it has cause fights and assaults on the cafe staff. I knew about this program last June. In District 150, about 80 percent qualify for a free lunch anyway. So, this eliminates the form, the ignorance and yes, it is just a way to do away with the paper work all for a $1.25 lunch. The school takes a count via student ID number and the State or Feds pay the school. Wouldn’t it be nice if conditions changed economically for all that we didn’t have to worry about this? Besides, I don’t mind feeding the kids, I’d rather disarm them first.
Emtronics, agreed! As I said in an earlier post, I am more concerned about the federal, state, and local taxpayer money that goes into buying these fly-by-night programs that make empty promises to solve the educational problems. I’d rather see the money go to feed children.
How did I ever get through school without the government taking care of all my needs? This type of “help” is exactly what is wrong with society. Keep people dependent on government and more controls will come later. Responsible parents would see to it to feed their kids and not depend on the nanny state to provide. How much trouble can it be to get a box of cereal and some milk and provide a breakfast.
However, all those parents who can afford to pay for lunch and breakfast could still give that money for some project at their children’s schools. However, many parents are still recouping from buying all the school supplies (like Kleenex, Clorox wipes, reams of paper) that are on so many of the lists.
PoO…your empathy is simply overwhelming. FYI sometimes it can be very difficult and it is rarely, if ever, the child’s fault…
PoO is right in some respects. This free lunch program has come to be expected by those in society who thinks that the government should take care of them. School lunch is the cheapest best value anywhere. Parents should be required to make sure their child has a lunch or has the money to buy a lunch. Free books, and many places handing out free school supplies yet look at the clothes and shoes these kids wear. $100 tennis shoes? $100 would pay for lunch damn near thru the whole school year. Sure, some families are indeed poor and this is a help but it is generation after generation that has grown up expecting, demanding, and getting free government services. Imagine what would happen if a social worker for public aid told a parent; “Here’s your Link card, your medical card and with these services we expect you to make sure your child has lunch money or you make them a lunch from the groceries you buy on that Link Card. If not, your benefits will be reviewed.
Ah hell, what am I talking about. Someone would complain to the state on their free cell phone.
Point of Information – Free books (book rental and school fee waiver) is based upon eligibility for free lunch. If you get free lunch you automatically get free books.
PoO – The problem I have with entitlements is that the money doesn’t get used wisely or for the intended purpose – a rent subsidy that doesn’t go for rent, for instance. In this case, you know where this money is going. Kids have no control over their situation – they just bear the brunt of it.
This is the nothing more than the Dems trying to keep a hamster cage full of little prisoners that are dependent on them for all their needs and will therefore continue to vote for them so that the Dems can stay in power as they continue to breed more little hamsters in their hamster cage. The hamsters are too stupid and too dependent to figure it out cause even if you lift the gate on the hamster cage they’ll still stay in the cage and wait for the Dems to throw them some more food instead of running free and foraging for food on their own. They’ll always be prisoners and so will all their future generations of little baby hamsters. Poor furry little hamsters.
Hamsterpalooza…how about us Democrats that don’t get any type of gov’t assistance? Perhaps you should look at oil companies, farmers, and big corporations as hampsters since some of them get welfare, too.
Let’s see how many of those who shouldn’t get free lunch (riding on the backs of the poor, in this case) attempt to give the money back by paying back what they would have paid for lunch.
O.k., . . . The first thing that came to mind when I read this post is 1) As a parent of a young child, I want to control what my child eats and so I don’t want free breakfast or lunch offered to my child at school and 2)school lunches don’t seem all that nutritious and so again, I don’t want them feed to my child. Can a parent put in a request not to have the meal provided to their student??
I am sorry, I agree with C.J.
Frustrated – I think anyone is free to bring a sack lunch.
Are these same children not already getting food stamps. Every time I stop at the gas station some kid is using a LINK card to buy soda, candy, and chips. That is the money that is supposed to be used to provide the child with breakfast and lunch. If the school is going to provide two free meals per day, then the LINK card award needs to be reduced by an equal amount.
For anyone who has missed the debt debate in Washington the government is broke and is using borrowed money to pay for these ever expanding programs.
bob – that’s the reason this is a GOOD program. The kids aren’t getting soda or candy. That is not an option. They are getting a nutritious meal.
We were told that if children bring soda and chips to school for lunch, we must allow them to drink and eat it. So, if you have a kindergartener bringing a 20 oz. Mountain Dew and a bag of “hot” chips for lunch, they can have it. I’m sorry, these are the same kids that already come to school hyped up….don’t need a “dew” to throw on the fire.
So far as I’m concerned a guaranteed public education is just that. Our public schools are not doing well at teaching the basics for whatever array of reasons you cite. Why entrust or burden them to do anything more. Breakfast, band programs, sports, etc… IMHO they all non-core and should be axed until the basics are perfected. Most advocate parents need to be involved, yet if you as the school feed the children 2 out of 3 meals then the school is that child’s primary source of meals. There are unintended consequences to social programs where we create a reward system for the dicouraged behavior we claim to be against or unhealthy.
Coorporate welfare, money to build hotels in downtown Peoria, etc.–those are way ahead of my list of government expenditures to complain about. I don’t think we have to worry about kids thinking of these breakfasts and lunches as the end and beall. The 8th year old getting ready to eat dinner at my house wasn’t all that happy with his lunch today–he used to take his brownbag it lunch. He’ll probably ask for it again.
And the Plantation continues to grow…
1.) Once again, those who work hard for food, shelter,and clothing are punished by Uncle Sam.
2.) When Ken said the “feds” are reimbursing 99.2%, who does he think we think he’s talking about? EVERYBODY KNOW “FEDS” MEANS JOHN Q. TAXPAYER, A.K.A. YOU AND ME.
Sorry–I meant David Kinney (re “feds”.):)
I am not sure if this is a good thing or not. Ever since the District stop taking care of the food itself and went with Aramark/Chartwells, the food sucks. Chicken nuggets a couple times a week, and nothing I would pay for let alone eat for free. And breakfast? Glazed buns, sugared cereal and chocolate milk. Chocolate milk with the sugared cereal. It really can’t be considered healthy. And all most kids today want is MCDonalds. I saw lots of parents bring it in. It is really sad.
I know everyone in P-town thinks Carl Cannon is the beat all to end all but remember he is being paid quite handsomely by D150 for his “volunteer” work. Lathan is passing out HUGE salaries to her ilk.
I wonder if some of you would have complained when Jesus fed the 5,000 for free. 🙂 I can just hear you complaining from the sidelines, standing with the Pharisees.
Sharon. Not sure if you realize this but we are in a recession in a bankrupt state in a deficit spending school district. Now would be a good time for JESUS to come and feed the masses for free! I’m broke from being taxed to death by D150.
I was being a tiny bit facetious. However, I am not in control of who does and does not get free lunch. Also, I do want people to be responsible and accountable, etc. I just grow tired of the hate that I hear spewed by some–especially, the hate directed at young children who really have little choice in the matter. Yes, I wish their parents all had jobs and were financially able to care for their children. I do appreciate C.J.’s take on the subject. The government was already paying for breakfast and lunch for those who meet poverty guidelines. Now children whose parents make good salaries are, also, eligible for lunch. So now the rich are on welfare, too. 🙂
The truth is that there will be considerable waste–especially at the middle school and high school level because those kids won’t like the food and will throw it in the garbage. From what I hear some of the primary kids did that today. I guarantee the rich kids won’t be eating these lunches. I hope the schools are able to take orders so that they know how many are eating, so there won’t be so much waste.
Whatever- I do agree about Mr Cannon somewhat..I do believe that he does great things in the community, however, some of our “leaders” paint the picture that he does all of this for free which if far from the truth. But I’m not against a person making a decent salary.
When Carl Cannon started out, I believe he was doing what he did for free. As he became successful, his skills became marketable. I don’t believe that anything is a cureall, but I believe Cannon has a good message and it’s bound to reach some kids–and that’s all we can do is to reach the reachable.
Where is Dave Haney?
P.S.–at least, Cannon’s a homegrown program–unlike all the other magic programs the District buys from companies who don’t even care about anything but the money. At least, this is Cannon’s home and he cares about Peoria.
Cannon is FULL of empty promises. He never follows through. I see him on tv and I seriously want to gag.
Whatever, sorry you lost me with “her ilk.”
Lets have the schools start clothing every kid that walks through the door. Winters are harsh and I think it would be better if the schools started putting cloths and shoes on these kids. What about heat, ac and a bed? Wouldnt the school do a better job then some of these kids families providing them with shelter? Just do an overnight boarding school type thing. Im sure that is why we have public education system. Its not like any of this costs money because the state and fed just reimburse the district or they just use it from the schools operating fund which comes from a magic pixie.
I really don’t get this sudden outcry about lunches and breakfasts for those below the poverty line. Free lunch and then breakfast several years ago have been available for a long time. The difference now is that the kids whose parents earn enough to buy their kids’ lunches are now going to get free lunch, too. Your complaints about people always getting something for nothing seem out of place. Those aren’t the people who are the beneficiaries of this new plan.
Whatever: Since when is trying to teach children manners,courtesy,confidence, self respect and respect for others something to complain about? You are way off base here. Why shouldn’t he earn a salary? In my opinion, he is a saint. Many of these children have never been exposed to the above concepts at home and maybe he will change their lives for the better, for the rest of their lives. The Elite program for the young ones is a brilliant idea.
My points on this issue:
1) Sharon is right, even children that come from middle & upper income homes will get free breakfasts and lunches. So does that mean those parents will gladly donate the meal money back to the district?
2) Not sure how this post on Dist. 150 meals turned into a hammer on Carl Cannon. But here is my take on him:
A) Which local group of youth & adult volunteers has been responsible for assisting in security at area festivals the last 3 years or so? When was the last time you heard about a fight or disturbance at places like HOI Fair, Steamboat Days, or Heritage Festival?
Which local group has reached out to young people, no matter their race or social status, especially in middle school; not just in Peoria, but in Pekin area, Limestone, Canton, and even as far as Kansas City, to let them know they can be somebody, they can succeed if they work hard?
Which local group has a great training program that helps teens become more employable, leading to jobs, thus keeping them off the streets and out of trouble? Best example is the over 100 youth working at Hy-Vee that went through ELITE.
B) The same people that are complaining about Carl Cannon and his ELITE program would the same people complaining if these same youth end up on the streets causing problems because they weren’t exposed to a program like Carl’s.
C) My younger daughter went through one of his earlier programs (CHOICES) when she was at Georgetown Middle School 7-8 years ago. And we’re a two-parent family, both employed, and were always involved in our childrens education. She is now a transfer student at ISU going for her Bachelor’s in Early Childhood Education. So his program can benefit ANY child.
D)Keep in mind that Carl Cannon does not work for himself; he is employed by the Peoria Park District; THEY have the contract with Dist. 150 for the great work he will do at Trewyn. A few years ago, the Peoria Park District embraced Carl’s successes, and established a Youth Outreach Division so CHOICES (and now ELITE) could continue steering youth in positive directions.
Now, somebody who has posted here cite me a reliable reference that tells you his salary?
Got to throw my two cents in on this one. I have personally known Carl Cannon for over ten years, have had two daughters involved in CHOICES and ELITE, and have worked with Carl at the Riverplex as a personal trainer. I can tell you without equivocation that Carl Cannon is motivated by his desire to see young people succeed in life. Period. The salary he draws from the Park District, whatever amount it is, cannot possibly reflect his personal dedication and commitment to the children. He is an asset to Peoria, an asset to the state of Illinois, and his presence is a blessing we should not take for granted. While there are many public figures in this town who are extremely political, Carl is not one of them. He is what he appears to be, an honest man with a mission to enhance and enrich the lives of children. Anyone who says anything to the contrary is an uninformed idiot.
F. Smith: have you had the opportunity to hear Cannon tell an auditorium full of students(elementary) that at the end of a school year, HE would have the entire school come to the Riverplex for a FUN day to celebrate the end of the school year…then NOT deliver? I have. In fact, I heard him promise this TWO years in a row and NEVER saw him again. His CHOICES and ELITE program are good, I agree. BUT, is he really touching the students that need it, or is it just a FEEL GOOD opportunity for him and the public?
F.Smith: did you know that Cannon was on the program to speak at the funeral of the 8 year old kid that shot in the head and died? When they called his name, he was no where to be found.
If that’s true, that ain’t good.
Taunya Jenkins is going back to Manual as the new principal!!!!
How we went from free lunch to Carl Cannon, I do not know. What I do know is that I have been in Trewyn quite a bit lately. Carl and his people are doing one thing….trying. I don’t think he is Jesus, but his heart is in the right place, and he is being paid, but it isn’t all that much. He has a lot of young men who are helping out too. Trust me, “I ain’t no bleeding heart liberal”. But they are doing something. I would say, what I have said for years, go and find out for your self. There is a wind of change at Trewyn. “It is better to light one candle, then to curse the darkness.”
If Cannon is paid by the school district, then it is public record. If you want to know, FOIA it.
“he is being paid, but it isn’t all that much”. From what has been kicked around, Cannon is making out like a bandit. BIG MONEY…..
I have so many FOIAs to sort through now–maybe someone else can FOIA this one–it’s not that hard, Whatever; let’s get the facts. Where is this being kicked around and why? As Emtronics said, FOIA and prove you really want to know.
I hear Jenkins is headed back to Manual.
Yup, Jenkins to Manual.
I do not understand why no board member questioned Principal Dr. Sharon Desmoulin-Kherat’s sudden resignation at Monday’s board meeting. Why was Martha Ross the only person supportive of Dr. Kherat? Why is this just allowed to happen? Dr. Kherat has devoted the last 13 years to the children of Peoria. How did it get in the HR report in such a big hurry? This board hired Dr. Kherat to oversee the Manual restructuring. I just do not get why nobody took the time to talk with her about what has led to this.
Yeah. I’m sure Cannon is making “big money” just like all of the teachers. You just have to pity those that are so incredibly misinformed!