Advocates say free school meals would have wide-ranging benefits
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Loading... - Reyes Estelle
- 06 Feb 2023
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When Sherry Hooper, executive director of The Food Depot, talks to the thousands of families across Northern New Mexico who use the regional food bank’s services, she hears a consistent story about household budgets.
First, she said, families pay for fixed expenses: They make rent or mortgage payments; they pay for gas and electricity to keep the lights and heat on; they fuel up vehicles so they can get to work.
What’s left of their meager income, Hooper said, will go toward food.
“What we see with families is that the most flexible piece of their budget is their food budget,” she said. “Oftentimes, we see that after paying all of those fixed expenses, there is nothing left for food.”
The situation grows dire. Parents start to skip meals so their children can eat. Cereal bowls are filled with water rather than more expensive milk.
A bill being considered by the Legislature is designed to relieve some of the pressure on families’ food budgets by providing free meals for all public school students. Senate Bill 4, backed by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham and announced as the “Kids Kitchens” initiative in her State of the State address Jan. 17, would provide a $30 million investment to cover the cost of all school meals, create incentives for districts to offer food from local producers, fund improvements to school kitchens and require up to 20 minutes of seated time for lunch.
Advocates say the bill would confront the prevalent and persistent problem of child hunger in New Mexico while improving students’ health and academic outcomes, and eliminating school lunch debt — which can cost districts thousands of dollars.
Discussion in the Senate Education Committee initially stalled SB 4, but a new version that addressed some lawmakers’ concerns — lengthening districts’ implementation time to two years and removing restrictions on lunch periods, among other changes — secured a unanimous vote to advance the measure. Read More…
