School lunch. The Associated Press File photo by the Associated Press
LISBON — Nearly a year ago the state Legislature passed a bill requiring public schools to feed students regardless of their ability to pay for meals. The law prevents identifying or otherwise stigmatizing a student with a meal debt. Now, local school districts say added restrictions are pushing school lunch debt higher.
Earlier this year, a Lisbon Falls business owner decided to help reduce Lisbon School Department’s school lunch debt. Maggie Oliver of Eastcraeft, a women’s clothing store on Main Street, held a fundraiser and raised $6,600 to donate toward the school district’s student lunch debt, which was hovering at about $15,000.
That debt grows by about $4,000 a year on average, said Allison Leavitt, the district’s nutrition director. Many school nutrition directors are frustrated by the new law, dubbed the “food shaming” bill.
“We’re not shaming kids,” she said.
Lisbon schools were already feeding kids no matter what, Leavitt said.
The new law makes it nearly impossible to reach parents about their student’s lunch accounts. The schools used to be able to ask high school students to go home and let their parents know they need more money on their lunch account, but now can’t communicate with students at all about lunch debt, “unless they ask us,” Leavitt said.
The school district ends up with this debt for a number of reasons. Sometimes parents whose children qualify for federally subsidized free and reduced meals assume the service rolls over from year to year and so they don’t fill out the forms required. For others, it’s a case of priority.
The threshold to qualify for free and reduced lunch also went up for this school year. To qualify for free lunch, a family of four must make less than $33,475 a year and less than $47,638 to qualify for reduced lunch.
“I think parents are on hard times,” she said. “Everybody has more bills than they used to 10 years ago, no question about it. Things coast more money and parents aren’t getting raises.”
Leavitt reaches out to parents by mailing letters and calling, but often it falls on deaf ears. Some parents send in $25 here and there and others don’t pay anything.
Some of the larger debt starts in elementary grades and grows year to year and there are already families that owe thousands of dollars.
“The big dollar issue isn’t an issue yet, but will be soon,” she said.
Lisbon isn’t alone. Maine School Administrative District 75 has an $11,883 lunch debt and Brunswick School Department has a $12,871 lunch debt.
Shawn Chabot, superintendent of MSAD 75, said the food shaming bill hasn’t changed his district’s practice of feeding students regardless of their ability to pay. However, it has drawn more attention to that policy.
“I think the challenges for school is … it’s almost impossible to know which families truly can’t afford lunch and breakfast for their children and which families are just making this choice because they know now their child won’t have a consequence for not paying,” Chabot said. “Some are taking advantage of the law.”
Chabot said the district will need to start building more money int0 the budget to account for the growing lunch debt, “and taxpayers will have to pick up the tab on that.”
Regional School Unit 1 is facing a school lunch debt of a little more than $15,000. Ultimately, there is a very small number of families in the district responsible for a large percentage of the debt, according to Tim Harkins. the food service director.
For example, Morse High School in Bath has an outstanding lunch debt of $6,321 spread over 113 students, according to Harkins. Of those, 46 students owe more than $25 and 19 students owe more than $100. One student owes more than $700.
“If I were to make a broad statement, I think that we have some families that are just chronic non-payers,” Harkins said.
Harkins doesn’t believe that food shaming is as chronic in the schools as it has been made out to be. The school district’s policy already allowed students a free meal as defined by the U.S. Department of Agriculture for its free and reduced lunch program. There are some parents running up bills though who can afford to pay for their children’s meals.
“We know that debt is going to be part of the program and we have taken it into consideration,” he said. But if it didn’t exist or weren’t so hefty, “there certainly could be greater things we could do for our students.”
Leavitt said while Lisbon’s food service program isn’t in the red yet and while there are good meal options, less debt would allow the schools to offer more options such as more fresh produce.
“In my opinion, the only answer is going to be universal free meals,” Leavitt said.
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