School Food Action Page

Urge Congress Not to Stand in the Way of Healthier School Lunches

As kids across the country head back to school, some members of Congress want to roll back progress on improving school lunches, despite the sky-high childhood obesity rates.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has proposed common-sense nutrition guidelines to improve school lunches and breakfasts, including more fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and low-fat milk and less salt, unhealthy fats, and calories.

The French fry industry and other food interests are working to get Congress to stop USDA from finalizing these sensible school nutrition standards. The House of Representatives has already included a rider in its Agriculture spending bill urging USDA to start over from scratch and propose a new set of school meal standards—even though tens of thousands of parents and organizations wrote in to support these important improvements.

If industry is successful in convincing the Senate to do the same, the goal of seeing healthy school lunches in cafeterias across the country will be in serious jeopardy.

Please help by sending an email to both of your Senators today asking them to support USDA's efforts to improve school meals.

Take action today by generating a letter!  Senate Ag Appropriations Bill Vote scheduled for Sept. 7^th.

https://secure2.convio.net/cspi/site/Advocacy?cmd=display&page=UserAction&id=1251

 

 

 

$4.5 BILLION CHILD NUTRITION ACT FINALLY PASSED 264-157 AND IS ON ITS WAY TO THE WHITE HOUSE TO GET SIGNED INTO LAW
THANKS TO ALL OF YOUR HARD WORK ON THIS IMPORTANT LEGISLATION -- WE'LL SEE ITS EFFECTS THROUGH 2015 AT LEAST!

Hello Everyone,
As you may know, S3307 is on the House calendar for tomorrow, Wednesday, December 1st. To gauge support for the bill, House Leadership surveyed Representatives over the holiday and learned that many members still oppose the bill because of SNAP cuts. Because of this continued opposition there is now a stronger sense that the White House, keen to pass the bill, is moved to make good on their promise to restore SNAP funding through a legislative vehicle in the lame duck session. Two positions are dominating on the national level: Some groups are calling for the House to pass S 3307 and then restore SNAP funds in another piece of “must-pass” legislation in the lame duck session (e.g., tax bill, continuing resolution), while others are simply calling for passage of S3307.

Please contact your Representatives TODAY to reinforce the message that “before the end of the 111th Congress we want a child nutrition bill that does not cut SNAP”. (For your reference I’ve also attached the letter we sent to Representatives with this message the week of Nov 15th). If you feel challenged to offer a position on how the bill is passed and you would prefer not to, you might say “the Congressional procedure that accomplishes this goal is the business of our members in Congress and not my area of expertise”. If you would like to offer more details to your Representative, feel free to use the information in the email below.

I want to make you aware the Representative Clarke has been recognized as one of the most outspoken members in opposition to SNAP cuts, largely in response to this group’s priorities. If Clarke is your Rep, please contact her office to share your gratitude for the Congresswoman’s efforts to carry your message through Congress.

PLEASE CONTACT YOUR REPRESENTATIVE TODAY. Although your communication with Congress has been valuable throughout this campaign, your call today will probably have the greatest impact on the fate of child nutrition reauthorization. Months ago, when I called members who were not on the authorizing committees, their staff had scarcely heard of the child nutrition bill. Today, when I called these members, everyone knew of the bill. ALL members’ attention is on the bill because they are asked to vote on it tomorrow. PLEASE CONTACT YOUR REPRESENTATIVE TODAY. Their contact is here.

Thank you!

Kristen

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Hello Everyone,

The purpose of this message is to describe the current status of the Child Nutrition Reauthorization in Congress and potential scenarios for movement on the bill through lame duck, as well as pros and cons to various actions you can take next week to impact the bill. There is a lot of information in this email. Please contact me with any questions.

House Leadership is expected to bring the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act, S3307, to a vote under “closed rule” early next week (week of 11/29). Under this rule the minority party can offer one amendment, then Representatives will vote for or against the bill. If a majority vote yes, S 3307 will go to the President to become law. On Monday, House Leadership surveyed the Ed and Labor Committee as to how they would vote. Representative Clarke, along with many of her colleagues, responded “leaning no” because the bill uses SNAP funds.

Some Congress members and advocates are calling unequivocally for quick passage of S 3307, despite the controversy over SNAP funds, in order to ensure the good provisions in the bill are not lost with the end of the 111th Congress when S3307 would expire. Others are calling for passage of S3307 only as part of a “package deal” that would restore the $2.2 billion in SNAP funds before the end of the 111th Congress. Others are opposed to any legislation that would reduce SNAP benefits regardless of the bill’s merits. Still others are opposed to S 3307 because of provisions in the bill unrelated to the use of SNAP funds.

To complicate matters, passage of S3307 is a priority for the White House and Michelle Obama in particular; unfortunately, conflicting messages from the Administration regarding the SNAP funding piece have prevented wholesale support of the bill. The quieter message suggests that the SNAP “money is gone” and the only way to “save it” is to use it for S3307 before it gets shifted into something unrelated in the next Congress, while the more public message offers a “commitment” from the Administration to restore the SNAP funds at some point in the future.

Amidst this healthy democratic debate there is genuine uncertainty as to whether this bill and its attendant controversial parts has enough support to pass.

Currently, the collective message of the NYC Alliance for CNR to our Congress members is to “pass a child nutrition bill that does not cut SNAP”. Over time our collective support for the bill has waned as the Senate’s version, which is minimally responsive to NYC’s needs, became the only viable bill, and as SNAP funds were proposed to pay for half of it.

For your reference, here is a summary of key provisions in S3307 and related history, as well as how closely they meet NYC priorities:

· The bill establishes a pilot to directly certify children receiving Medicaid benefits for free school meals. This option is among the top priorities for NYC because it would expand access to free meals to many more eligible children (NYC has 2.9 million Medicaid recipients and only 1.8 million SNAP recipients). Unfortunately, as written in S3307, NYC would NOT qualify for this option because of its size.


· The bill does NOT eliminate the reduced price category for meals. This option is among the top priorities for NYC, which has many fewer students eating lunch in the “reduced price” category as compared to the “free” category, and the reduced-price payment is believed to be a major barrier for these students to access meals. On the flip side, the bill requires school districts to gradually increase their “paid” lunch charges until the revenue per lunch matches the federal free reimbursement level. NYC and other districts that have large proportions of students whose family incomes are above 185% of poverty but still fairly low are concerned that this increase will prevent many students from being able to pay for a school meal, thus decreasing participation among “paid” students. (The current charge in NYC for a “paid” lunch is $1.50, and the reimbursement for a free meal is $2.72).

· The bill provides a 6 cent increase for lunch reimbursements. This provision is widely referenced as an investment to “improve food quality”; technically, this increase will only be available to districts that meet new nutrition guidelines, and it is estimated that over 90% of districts currently meet these guidelines. During the Reauthorization process NYC estimated 70 cents would be needed to make food quality improvements; the School Nutrition Association (SNA) estimated 35 cents would be needed to meet the cost of food produced at current quality levels; and the IOM estimated that, at minimum, 9-12 cents would be needed to meet their improved nutrition guidelines. Reports from USDA have hinted that IOM standards will be implemented next year regardless of whether reimbursements increase. Many are concerned that school districts will have difficulty meeting these new guidelines without the increase, while others point out that 6 cents is insufficient to make measurable change. As a reference, $3 billion of the $4.5 billion in S3307 will go toward this 6 cent increase.

· The bill provides $25 million nationwide over 5 years in mandatory funding for farm to school programs, which is a priority of the NYC Alliance for CNR.

· The bill gives USDA authority to set nutrition standards, based on the most recent set of Dietary Guidelines, for all foods sold in schools during the school day. This is a priority of the NYC Alliance for CNR and is supported by NYC with the caveat that federal standards not pre-empt localities from setting their own higher nutrition standards for these foods (current nutrition standards for competitive foods in NYC schools are among the most robust nationwide). The bill does not specify how the rule will be implemented with regard to local control except to say that the Secretary of Agriculture should “consider existing school nutrition standards, including voluntary standards for beverages and snack foods and State and local standards” when establishing national standards.

· CACFP: The bill does NOT add the option of serving an additional meal or snack to children who are in child care for over eight hours, which is among NYC’s top priorities for CACFP.

· WIC: The bill DOES allow the option to certify children for WIC for a period of one year (up from 6 months), which is a priority of the NYC Alliance for CNR.

· SNAP: The bill eliminates $2.2 billion in SNAP funds, which will reduce the monthly benefit amount for all SNAP recipients over the period November 2013 to April 2014 by an average of $59/month for a family of four. As a reference, a reduction in benefits of $25/month would cost NYC SNAP recipients approximately $4.4 million in benefits per month or $22 million over the 5 month period, and the NYC economy approximately $76 million in growth per month or $320 million over the 5 month period. (This estimate is derived by multiplying 1.78 million NYC SNAP recipients X $1.73 in economic growth for every dollar in SNAP benefits X $25 reduction in benefits per SNAP recipient per month.) This loss of SNAP benefits is the major source of NYC and national opposition to the bill.

I hope this information helps prepare you to communicate with your Representatives next week. You can find their contact info here. November 29th to December 3rd is a critical time for this bill, but keep in mind that Congressional business of interest to this group may continue after next week, e.g., if S3307 passes there may be a follow up bill to restore SNAP funds. I will keep you informed of opportunities to impact these decisions.

Thank you!

Kristen

******************************************************************************************** Congress is about to reconvene for the “Lame duck” session next Monday, November 15th. We’ve heard from DC that the House may not return for the last week of legislative session after Thanksgiving, and so they will likely vote on the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act as part of an omnibus bill during the first days of next week. In light of this, Bridgette DeHart has asked that we send our message to Representative Clarke and the NY delegation FIRST THING Monday morning.

As we agreed earlier this month, I’ve drafted a letter for this purpose, asking our Representatives to pass the child nutrition bill along with a restoration to the SNAP cut before the end of the 111th Congress. You can use this text (pasted below) to send a letter on your organization’s letterhead, or cut and paste into a form on your Representative’s website, or for talking points to offer them by phone. You can find your Representative’s contact information here.

Kristen Mancinelli,
MS, RD Senior Manager, Policy and Government Relations
City Harvest

Dear Representative:

As you reconvene in the final days of this 111th Congress to make decisions that will impact NYC residents, we ask that you pay particular attention to the Child Nutrition Reauthorization bill likely to come before the House next week.

We ask you to hold Leadership and the Administration accountable to their promise to find another way to pay for the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act S 3307 other than by using SNAP funds, and to pass both this bill and a restoration to the $2.2 billion cut to SNAP before Congress adjourns for the year.

You may remember receiving our “thank you” letter for refusing in September to take money from families struggling to feed children at home in order to pay for the same children’s meals at school. This decision was right for New York City then, and remains so today.

On behalf of the 1.7 million NYC residents that rely on SNAP – hundreds of thousands of whom are children – we cannot support this shift in dollars into child nutrition programs that will threaten children’s access to good food at home.

Please do what's best for NYC children: Pass the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act and restore $2.2 billion in funds to SNAP before the end of the 111th session of Congress.

Thank you.
Members of the NYC Alliance for CNR

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Right now, the White House is the best target for our message, as our Representatives are in election mode through Tuesday. I’ve attached here a letter to the President that I’ll send tomorrow, and you can use this as a template for your organization to send as well. I’d recommend sending it before Tuesday.

Some of you may have participated in FRAC’s “virtual CNR rally” also aimed at the White House, and my apologies for not alerting you earlier today to the second round of that event. City Harvest posted a link to the event on our Facebook page and you can do the same if you’d like! Here’s the link: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=143487689031040

I spoke with Bridgette DeHart yesterday, our contact in Yvette Clarke’s office, who let me know that the committee will have a better sense of potential progress on the bill and proposed offset difficulties after the election. I’ll plan to speak with her at the end of next week and then circulate a letter to Representatives for your sign ons, just as we did in September, and will also ask that you send the letter from your individual organizations if you’re able. We’ll aim to fax and email these on November 15th so that our Representatives get the message upon returning to their DC offices.

In addition to preparing for letters and phone calls during lame duck, I’d like to offer to plan some final activities as a group if there is interest. For example, we could meet or request a conference call with Representatives in their NYC offices before they head back to DC, take a final trip to DC the week of Nov 8 or 15, or plan a community event in NYC. Please let me know if you have other ideas or interest in participating in anything suggested here.

Thank you!
Kristen Mancinelli, MS, RD
Senior Manager, Policy and Government Relations
City Harvest
Letter to President CNR Oct 2010.doc

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Despite heavy pressure from the White House and House Leadership over the past week, your Representatives refused to pass a Child Nutrition Bill that cut funds from SNAP because they heard from you that this was unacceptable.

Instead, they passed a “continuing resolution” that extends the current child nutrition act until December 2010 to have time to find, at least, a replacement for the SNAP offset.

Your voices – both individual and collective – made this change happen.

Although the current proposed bills are not perfect, either one would, if passed, solidify into law many of the improvements the NYC Alliance for CNR and other groups like ours around the country have asked for in child nutrition programs.

The best way to do this is to keep communicating about the value of this bill to our Representatives through the next few weeks. Their attention will understandably be focused on the election. I list below some talking points for this effort.

You can call them or fax the below letter – ideally both! (Find their contact info here.)

1. Please THANK your Representatives for refusing to pass the Healthy, Hunger Free Kids Act, (S 3307), with a $2.2 billion cut to SNAP/Food Stamps.
2. ASK them replace the SNAP offset with something that does not diminish children’s ability to access good food at school, home, or anywhere.
3. Urge them to pass a strong child nutrition bill before the end of the year and the 111th Congress.

THANK YOU again for all you’ve done and continue to do for children in New York City.
Thank you letter to NYC Reps for opposing Senate bill w SNAP cuts Sept 30.doc(3).pdf

Thursday, August 4 the Senate passed the Hunger-Free Kids Act through unanimous consent with an increase in funding of $4.5 million a year.

Other features of the bill:

Funding for the bill was found through offsets from the SNAP program.
Department of Agriculture is mandated to develop nutrition standards for all foods sold in schools, including so-called "competitive foods."
Schools meeting the new standards will receive an increase of 6 cents per meal, per child.
There will be new funding for school gardens and local sourcing.

Now the House must pass its own version of the bill before the legislation expires on September 30.

Important message from Kristen Mancinelli of NYC Alliance for CNR:

You may have heard that the Senate passed their CNR bill yesterday by unanimous consent. This bill, as you know, contains $4.5 billion for child nutrition. We had hoped the bill would pass before recess and the momentum would build for the House to pass their version upon return in September with just two weeks before the bill expired. That has happened, and there is some cause for celebration.

Unexpectedly, however, the Senate cut $2.2 billion from SNAP (Food Stamps) in order to pay for the child nutrition bill. This Alliance has focused on seeing a strong child nutrition bill and has not developed an advocacy agenda for SNAP. However, we did unanimously agree to oppose funding cuts from SNAPED to pay for CNR when those surfaced in the Senate bill.

I will share my opinion that SNAP, although not a school or child care based program, is important to achieving the goals of this Alliance for all children to have easy access to healthy food. City Harvest is disappointed to see this shift of resources from one vital nutrition program to another, and we have registered that disappointment with our Senators.

I urge you to share your opinion, whatever it is, with Senator Gillibrand (202) 224-4451 and Senator Schumer 202-224-6542. You can thank them for moving this bill, voice concerns about the funding level and source, and share any perspective you have. This is really the last opportunity you will have to have your Senators attention on this bill now that it’s passed the chamber. I urge you to take this opportunity to weigh in with about their decisions. For more information you can read Senator Gillibrand’s press release, or Senator Lincoln’s.

More importantly, there is still time to influence House action on CNR and impact the funding and content of the bill. The House version of CNR invests $8 billion in child nutrition programs (instead of $4.5 billion) and has not targeted other nutrition programs to pay for it. PLEASE TAKE THIS OPPORTUNITY to contact your Representative and ask that they fully fund and pass HR 5504, the Improving Nutrition For America’s Children Act, when they return from recess, and that they do so without cutting funds from other nutrition programs.

This message to the House is truly important. Our Representatives will return to DC next Tuesday for an emergency vote, and there is concern that the less-well-liked Senate version of CNR will be passed in the House at that time. Again, the Senate bill makes only half the investment in child nutrition and cuts SNAP/Food Stamps to do so. We want the stronger House bill to move forward. Please call your Representative Monday to have your say in the final moments of this debate.

Thank you again for your support for child nutrition. Let’s hope we start the new year with an $8 billion bill and other vital nutrition programs intact!

Kristen

News Coverage
Washington Post
Politico
New York Times Prescriptions Blog
The Hill
FRAC Urges Opposition to Senate Vote on child nutrition
Washington Independent

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Chairman Miller of the Education and Labor Committee introduced his draft bill in a press conference Thursday morning. An overview of the bill is available here.

The House version, titled “Improving Nutrition for America’s Children Act”, proposes $8 billion over ten years (or $800 million a year) – almost double the Senate version and much closer to the President’s proposal. Major provisions are similar to those in the Senate version. Among those in which this group has a strong interest are:

· a 6 cent increase in the reimbursement rate for school meals

· expansion of community eligibility based on a multiplier of the number of students in a school directly certified through SNAP (same as the Senate version)

· incentive to improve direct certification - $4 million per year for up to 15 states for good performance or substantial improvements

· a pilot for direct certification through the Medicaid program - differs from the Senate version in that the pilot would be available to a given number of states each year (2 states in 2011, 5 in 2013, etc, until 2019 in which any state could use this method) rather than an area that serves a given percent of free or reduced price students

· $10 million in competitive grants to schools to expand breakfast, including for the purchase of equipment for alternative breakfast models (e.g., grab and go or breakfast in the classroom)

· giving USDA authority over competitive foods

· $50 million in mandatory funding for farm to school programs

· mandates water to be available for students on the lunch line

· a pilot program for 5 states to provide a third meal or snack through CACFP for children in care for 8 hours or more

· an allocation of ½ cent per meal served to be used for nutrition education in school and additional funding support for wellness councils

Please take this opportunity to remind Congressman Rangel that Child Nutrition is a top priority for New Yorkers and urge him to do all in his power within the Ways and Means Committee to find at least $1 billion for the bill. You can fax NYC for CNR's letter to his DC office at 202 225 0816.

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Check out Kim O'Donnel's recap of CNR on Culinate.

Additional CNR updates and support needed:

For a comprehensive summary of the Senate Agriculture Committee’s CNR bill, “Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act”, see FRAC http://www.frac.org/pdf/Summary_SchoolMeals.pdf

NYC Alliance for CNR sent Michelle Obama a letter urging her vocal support for increased funding for CNR as she promotes Chefs Move to Schools and until Congress invests in the bill the funding that child nutrition deserves. The letter includes the Alliance language calling on Congress to invest at minimum President Obama’s requested $1 billion and underscoring the point that NYC would like to see $4 billion invested in Child Nutrition Reauthorization.

At the end of May, every Rep from NYC voted in favor of an amendment introduced by Rep McGovern to the Defense Reauthorization Bill calling for increased funding for Child Nutrition Reauthorization. This bill does not allocate funding to CNR, but rather is a record that Congress feels the bill should be fully funded at the level requested by the President. Passage of CNR is now gaining momentum, but we need to keep up the pressure for fulling funding it.

You can act to make improvements to this bill by following FRAC’s 3 easy steps (one is to urge Reps to sign the Dear Colleague letter so you’ve got one down, two to go!): http://www.frac.org/Legislative/action_center/dear_colleague_april2010.htm

If Farm to School is your interest, the National Farm to School Network needs support for bill HR 4710 in the House. See very clear instructions on what you can do here: http://www.farmtoschool.org/policy/NFSNHouse.pdf