NORTHERN CALIFORNIA – State Sen. Mike McGuire’s bill that automatically qualifies low-income students for free meals at school has passed both houses of the California Legislature and has been sent to the governor’s desk.
SB 138 – the “Feed the Kids Act” will address childhood hunger by removing a massive layer of bureaucratic red tape from the State school meal program enrollment process and by serving all students in very high poverty schools for free.
SB 138 will develop a universal enrollment process by ensuring that all school districts utilize Medi-Cal data to seamlessly enroll income-eligible students in free and reduced-price school meals.
California has more kids in poverty than any other state in the nation, with nearly one in four kids going hungry each day.
There are more California kids in poverty now than there were prior to the recession. As such, McGuire said the time is right for California to broaden the reach of school meals.
Each year, more than two million low-income California children who are eligible to receive free or reduced-price school meals miss out on them, also missing out on the academic and health benefits the meals provide, McGuire’s office reported.
“A child’s access to nutritious food during the school day is linked to their overall success in the classroom,” McGuire said. “We know that when a child goes to school hungry, their ability to learn, grow and thrive is compromised. School meals are extremely effective at fighting the devastating effects of child hunger and improving outcomes in our public schools.”
Should SB 138 be signed into law, there are 41 additional schools on the North Coast that would likely qualify for a 100 percent federal reimbursement for school meals for all of their students.
Those schools include 13 small schools in Sonoma County, nine in Humboldt County, four in Marin County, eight in Lake County, two in Trinity County, one in Del Norte County and four in Mendocino County.
Currently, most districts do not use Medi-Cal data to automatically enroll students. This bill will automatically enroll income-eligible students who are on Medi-Cal onto the free and reduced lunch program at their school, therefore increasing the number of kids receiving free and reduced lunch.
The California Department of Education believes an additional 650,000 elementary, middle school and high school students would start receiving school meals under this new and efficient certification process.
This bill is modeled after a successful pilot program where 14 school districts enrolled low-income students who receive Medi-Cal into a free school meal statewide.
Building upon these successful local programs, SB 138 would automatically enroll eligible Medi-Cal students into reduced price and free meals as a way to address hunger among our state’s hungriest kids.
In addition, the bill would allow for very high poverty schools to serve meals to all students for free because increased enrollment of low-income students in the free meal program will result in schools qualifying for a federal meal reimbursement program as well.
SB 138 would more effectively identify low-income students and significantly increase access to school meals. Participating districts in the pilot program saw an increase of more than 60,000 students enrolled in their free and reduced lunch programs, which brought in over $33 million in additional federal meal reimbursements.
Two years ago, Senator McGuire made significant progress by cutting through bureaucratic red tape by enrolling over 326,000 students on free lunches.
The process was made easier by streamlining the free lunch system and ensuring students who were on CalFresh were also being enrolled in the free lunch program at their school.
This was a 30-percent increase from the year before and was one of the largest enrollment increases the Golden State has seen in decades.
“California is the sixth largest economy in the world and we produce more food than any other state in America. We have to step up and declare war on childhood poverty and ensure California’s kids get the resources they need to thrive,” McGuire said.
McGuire’s bill providing universal free school meals for students on Medi-Cal Heads to governor’s desk
- Lake County News reports
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