District to weigh price increase for school lunches

By Paul Takahashi

Saturday, June 2, 2012 | 2 a.m.

Families may pay up to an additional $45 per child next year under a school lunch price increase being considered by the Clark County School Board.

The increase is tied to new federal requirements that take effect next year under the Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010. School districts across the nation are increasing lunch prices to comply with the law.

The law increases the nutritional value requirements of school meals but also prohibits school districts participating in the National School Lunch Program from using federal dollars to subsidize students who don’t receive free or reduced-priced lunches.

The School District’s food purchases are subsidized through the National School Lunch Program, at about $2.51 per school lunch. The new law does not allow school districts to charge less than that — to avoid subsidizing paying students.

The district’s Food Service Department feeds about 162,000 of the district’s 309,000 schoolchildren every day of the school year. The majority of these students qualify for free or reduced-priced lunches, with about 30,000 paying full price for school lunches.

The new law mandates that school districts charging less than $2.51 pay for the balance by dipping into its general fund. The cash-strapped Clark County district doesn’t have the $523,258 needed to bridge the food budget gap caused by the new federal mandates, said Charles Anderson, Food Service director.

“We don’t want to raise school lunch prices,” he said, adding that his department operates under budget. “We’ve tried to keep from raising prices, but that’s the law. We have to follow it.”

District officials requested several times to allow the Food Service Department to charge lunch items a la carte to offset its food budget shortfall. The federal government denied the requests.

The School Board will consider two options: to raise lunch prices by 10 cents next year, or about $18 annually per child, or raise lunch prices by 25 cents, or about $45 annually per child.

A third option to raise lunch prices by 50 cents, or $90 annually per child, is off the table.

The last time the School District raised school lunch prices was in 2009-10, and it was by 25 cents to bring the food service department into the black.

Currently, school lunches at the elementary school level cost $1.75. School lunches at the middle and high school levels cost $3.

The lunch price increase won’t affect students in the free and reduced-price lunch program. The Clark County School District has the third highest number of students — 57 percent — participating in the free and reduced price lunch program, behind only school districts in Los Angeles and New York City.

The School Board meets at 4 p.m., Monday, June 4, at the Edward Greer Education Center, 2832 E. Flamingo Road.