School
meals: A study in inflation
Districts
across the country are increasing the prices they charge for
breakfast and lunch
Tuesday, August 10, 2004 • BY J.M. HIRSCH •
Associated Press
SOMERSWORTH, N.H. --
Back-to-school checklists will have children scrambling for
a new item this year -- more lunch money.
Feeling the pressure of
rising food, labor and transportation costs, schools
nationwide are increasing the price of breakfast and lunch,
in some cases for the first time in more than a decade and
by as much as $1.
Duane Ford, business
director for Somersworth schools, said this year's 25-cent
increase -- the first in 10 years -- is just the start.
Staff cuts, eliminating the breakfast program and another
increase next year also are being considered.
"What we did in terms of
changing our price isn't enough," he said recently. "You
start looking at reports saying, 'Oh, my God, what are we
going to do? This isn't working.'"
The increases don't affect
the nearly 17 million children who get free or reduced-price
lunches and who account for more than half of the 29 million
children served by the National School Lunch Program this
year.
Forty cents is the limit
for a reduced-price meal. But prices for kids who don't meet
the poverty rules are set by local school districts and have
no price cap. It is those prices that some schools are
raising -- from a few cents to a dollar per
meal.
School systems typically
get no local money for their lunch programs. They get by on
meal sales, vending machine sales and the use of government
commodities. But schools complain that the federal system
hasn't kept pace with the cost of food. Budgets in the red
are routine.
While typical annual food
inflation is about 3 percent, dairy prices in June were up
27 percent from a year ago, according to the U.S. Department
of Agriculture. Meat and cheese were up 11 percent, and
poultry 9 percent.
There also is a catch-up
factor at play. Schools generally avoid raising prices for
as long as possible. That means many communities are just
now covering for years of incremental cost increases in
addition to the recent spike.
It all added up to a 17
percent food cost increase at the Galt Joint Union High
School District in Galt, Calif., where officials recently
relented, raising meal prices to $3 after holding them to $2
for the past 12 years.
The district wanted to
hold the increase to 50 cents, but feared having to go back
to parents for more money next year.
A reasonable fear, said
Barry Sackin, spokesman for the American School Food Service
Association. Even tiny price hikes can hurt participation,
especially among families that hover above poverty but don't
qualify for free or reduced-cost meals.
For Carol Rippa, food
service director for 72,000 students at Northside
Independent School District in San Antonio, gasoline was a
major culprit behind a 25-cent increase.
"We have 350 square miles
in our school district," she said. "We're busy taking the
food to all 75 schools that are scattered throughout the 350
square miles. The fuel cost makes the food cost
more."
At schools in Oshkosh,
Wis., where the cost of milk alone is up $100,000 more than
the district anticipated, lunch price increases are expected
to cost the average child an additional $17.70 a
year.
The recent national push
to make school food healthier also comes with a price.
Eliminating junk food can hurt income.
Texas recently adopted
strict new school nutrition standards that include
restrictions on fried foods. That's forcing many schools to
dump their deep-fat fryers and buy pricey new
equipment.
In the
Hurst-Euless-Bedford Independent School District in Bedford,
Texas, school officials increased meal and drink prices to
help offset an expected $500,000 needed to equip its 27
schools with new ovens.
Labor prices also have
crept up, mostly because of health care costs. Sackin said
that while salaries have remained steady, more districts now
use health benefits to attract workers.
Schools aren't alone in
feeling the pressure. The USDA, which runs the National
School Lunch Program, spends about $948 million a year to
supply schools with roughly 18 percent of the food they
serve.
But this year its buying
power is reduced. Like families, the agency is watching
prices carefully, hoping to avoid spending more to buy the
same amount of food.
The blow is softened
somewhat for schools that use outside food service
companies, most of which cater for thousands of schools and
can leverage that purchasing power for better prices -- and
creative solutions.
For example, don't be
surprised if your child's chicken nuggets are replaced by
cheaper chicken-and-soy nuggets this year, said Nancy Quinn
of Chartwells School Dining Services, which has contracts
with 3,000 schools.
And the outlook isn't all
bad. Ephraim Leibtag, a food price economist at the USDA,
said the price of milk -- the only food federally mandated
for every school meal -- already shows signs of
moderating.
The agency also has
increased the credit it gives schools -- up 1 1/2 cents to
just over 17 cents per meal -- for spending on government
food commodities in 2005.
Some schools hope the cost
increase is temporary and have put off deciding whether to
raise prices. At Rio Linda Union School District in Rio
Linda, Calif., food service director Susan Stewart is
finding ways to save money, instead.
She favors turning off the
lights.
"It's been like a contest
where every time you leave a room you turn off a light," she
said. "It's something that's controllable and it doesn't
require a cut in staff or a cut in spending."
Copyright 2004 The Star-Ledger. Used by NJ.com with
permission.
|