(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) DJ Bracken, founder of the Utah Lunch Debt Relief Foundation, and his daughter, Liara Bracken holding checks to local elementary schools, in Riverton on Tuesday, Sept. 30, 2025.
So one Riverton dad was rightly scandalized to learn that Utah public school students — and their families — were carrying $2.8 million in debt because they couldn’t keep up with the cost of their school lunches.
But instead of just whining, D.J. Bracken decided to do something about it. And the results will soon be showing up on a Utah automobile near you.
Bracken’s Utah Lunch Debt Relief Foundation is jumping through the bureaucratic hoops, and raising the necessary funds, to have the state start issuing a special series of auto license plates with the message “End School Lunch Debt.”
Each license plate will raise money toward retiring the lunch debt of Utah families.
The total school lunch debt in Utah has only grown since Bracken began his efforts, topping $3.6 million this year. Which just makes his efforts all the more important.
Sending a child to school, which is both necessary and required by law, should not put families in financial peril.
And kids should not have to pay the price of the shame and hunger that comes from skipping school, skipping lunch or, as is the case in some districts, being handed a cold sack lunch while their classmates are eating the standard hot meal.
Ideally, Backen’s efforts should not be necessary. Lunch is a fundament part of the school day. (So is breakfast.) And the state should fund it routinely.
Beyond just meeting each student’s nutritional needs, mealtime is key to socialization and forming group bonds. Just ask any group of adults who so often do business over lunch.
It’s not that Utah has done nothing. In 2024, Gov. Spencer Cox rightly directed $1.2 million in COVID relief funds to paying off lunch debts. This year, he signed a bill to see to it that students who qualify under federal rules for reduced price meals get them for free. But all that’s not enough.
Until the state steps up and ends the whole concept of school lunch debt, Utahns should support Bracken’s foundation. And show their concern on the backs of their cars.
Editorials represent the opinions of The Salt Lake Tribune editorial board, which operates independently from the newsroom.