Supporters of the state’s universal school meals program said during a Statehouse press conference on Thursday that Scott’s plan to slash the popular program makes no sense. It would only shift the cost of feeding kids back onto mostly middle-class families that can ill afford the additional expense, they said.
“Apparently, the governor hasn’t done his math homework,” Sen. Joe Major (D-Windsor) said.
Legislative leaders have been telegraphing for weeks that they weren’t fans of the school meals piece of the governor’s plan to keep property taxes flat next year. His other proposal involves transferring $77 million in general fund dollars to to the state education fund.
Thursday’s event was the strongest signal yet that Democratic lawmakers have no intention of killing a program that feeds kids and supports local farmers.
“We don’t need to make Vermont more affordable on the backs of our children,” said former Sen. Bobby Starr (D-Essex Orleans), who said families in the Northeast Kingdom rely heavily on the program.
The federal government pays about $17 million for the program, which allows all school kids to eat breakfast and lunch for free regardless of their family’s income level. The state education fund picks up the balance, or $18.5 million this year.
Scott says while the program is well intentioned, it seems wrong for families who can afford their kids’ lunches to get a free ride. The result, he argues, is that property tax payers are subsiding free meals for rich kids. Scott favors returning to the pre-pandemic system under which only low-income kids get free meals, paid for primarily by the feds.
Democrats counter that reverting to the pre-pandemic system is unfair and counterproductive. They point to the estimates from the Joint Fiscal Office, the state’s nonpartisan number crunchers, that estimate it would cost an extra $103,000 for districts to administer a restored price-based program.
They say there would be costs associated with reinstalling cash registers in school cafeterias, reestablishing a billing system and collecting from parents.
They also note that local farmers could also lose revenue if a program that uses fresh local milk and produce is eliminated and more families send their kids to school with other fare or none at all. The advocacy group Hunger Free Vermont, estimates the program saves families of children who use it about $1,500 per year per child in food costs.
“How is this program even up for debate?” asked Rep. Heather Suprenant (D-Barnard).
Democrats have yet to fully explain what programs they would cut or revenue they would raise to keep property tax rates from rising again next year. They argue, however, that kids learn better if they’re not hungry, and that the program eliminates the stigma created by the old system, when kids who got free meals stood out as poor.
Major, the senator from Windsor, drove that point home with a poignant story of a meal program manager who tearfully testified that under the old system, she once couldn’t provide a hot meal to a 6-year-old child because her family’s bill was too high. Because of this, the manager was only allowed to give the child a different meal, Major said.
“That alternative meal was a cold cheese sandwich,” Major said, pausing for dramatic for effect. “We cannot do that to Vermont children.”