Economy Boosts Demand For Free Lunches

WASHINGTON - June 11, 2009— -- School systems nationwide are trimming lunch menus, buying more food in bulk and delaying purchases of kitchen equipment to offset the costs of serving free or reduced-price lunches to millions of newly eligible students from cash-strapped families.

Record enrollment in subsidized meal programs has school systems large and small stretching already paper-thin budgets to ensure that students are well-fed and ready to learn. No region seems immune.

In New York City, which has the nation's largest school system, 73 percent of students received free or discount lunches this year, up from 71 percent in 2007-2008. In Chicago, participation jumped to 84.3 percent from 82 percent in 2007-2008 and 75 percent the year before. Dade County, Fla., schools saw a 3.8 percent jump, to 66.7 percent.

Districts get a federal reimbursement for each lunch they serve, but that reimbursement typically comes up 15 to 50 cents short for every meal, depending on whether state and local governments kick in additional money, according to the School Nutrition Association, which represents school lunch officials.

Twenty-two states and some cities, such as Bridgeport, Conn., provide additional meal subsidies to schools, but most districts' food departments have to cover the balance. Nationwide, that amounts to millions of dollars a day that schools pay from their own budgets to augment federal subsidies, the association says.

The Mesa, Ariz., school district, near Phoenix, doesn't get any money from the state to help feed its kids, though 3,000 more students qualified for free and discounted meals this academic year.

To pay for the increase, the district manages food "down to the last student," says Loretta Zullo, director of food and nutrition. Instead of having all the food ready when lunch starts, elementary schools "cook while the kids are coming through the line, so you don't end up with three pans of pizza or burritos left," she says.

The 33-cent muffin on a fruit and yogurt breakfast plate was popular, "but we couldn't afford it," Zullo says, so it was dropped in favor of a whole-grain cracker that costs only 11 cents.

Indianapolis public schools cut expenses by purchasing supplies "by the truckload" and storing the food at a central facility that prepares meals for delivery to individual schools, says Velda Hamman, director of food services. Menu choices are limited to save money, even at the high schools, she adds. "We don't do junk food."

In Indianapolis, 83.6 percent of students qualified for free or reduced-price lunches this year, up slightly from previous years. At 51 of its 72 schools, all students eat for free because such a high percentage qualify on the basis of family income that the district waives the fee for everyone, as permitted by federal law.

In Jackson, Miss., the school system pays about 50 cents on top of the federal subsidy for each of the 25,500 lunches it serves daily, says food services director Mary Hill. "We have to be very creative to keep up," she adds, noting that she has put off kitchen equipment purchases.

To qualify for a free school lunch, a family of four can have an income of no more than $27,560 per year under the 2008-2009 federal guidelines. For a reduced-price lunch, the limit is $39,220.