Rising lunch costs.

As of January 12th the lunch cost for me will rise to $2.50 a 42% increase from what I've been paying. I currently shell out $8.75 for lunch and I do not qualify for free or reduced lunch , as of the 12th I have an option pay 12.50 a week for the same meal that was worth 8.75 a week. Now here is what I foresee and I hope you didn't overlook this factor , The small percentage of people that do indeed pay full price for lunch forcing the most of us to bring lunch every day. Leaving you with a minuscule amount of students , staff etc paying FULL price. so that leaves you with the quarter , free group. The government probably isn't reimbursing you for the tax cut so the deficit will grow. Solution? Don't just increase the costs for the full pricers. Increase it for all , .25 goes to .50 or .75 a small percent increase. And the 1.75 crow goes to 2.00 respectively that's much easier to carry around anyways.

I have to agree that raising the lunch prices will not cure the lunch deficit. If the reimbursement rate from the federal govt for free and reduced lunches is not covering the costs and raising the prices decreases the number of kids eating that pay full price, how will anything change?

citizenwhowillnotcope wrote:

As of January 12th the lunch cost for me will rise to $2.50 a 42% increase from what I've been paying. I currently shell out $8.75 for lunch and I do not qualify for free or reduced lunch , as of the 12th I have an option pay 12.50 a week for the same meal that was worth 8.75 a week. Now here is what I foresee and I hope you didn't overlook this factor , The small percentage of people that do indeed pay full price for lunch forcing the most of us to bring lunch every day. Leaving you with a minuscule amount of students , staff etc paying FULL price. so that leaves you with the quarter , free group. The government probably isn't reimbursing you for the tax cut so the deficit will grow. Solution? Don't just increase the costs for the full pricers. Increase it for all , .25 goes to .50 or .75 a small percent increase. And the 1.75 crow goes to 2.00 respectively that's much easier to carry around anyways.

A: The increase in the price for a school breakfast and lunch is necessary given the current and projected deficit in the food service program. This is not being done without a lot of concern; however meal prices have not increased for more than ten years. That said, you are correct, the only people affected by this price increase are those students who do not qualify for free or reduced or those who choose not to complete the paperwork to qualify. The district is not permitted to increase the price for the reduced food service program as that is set by the government. The price increase only addresses a part of the overall problem. We are also looking at ways to reduce the cost of running our food service program, including staffing and employee costs in this area, as part of our effort to close this deficit.

So how will the deficit improve when less kids who pay the full price eat breakfast and lunch?

Sandra wrote:

So how will the deficit improve when less kids who pay the full price eat breakfast and lunch?

A: The district currently loses money for each breakfast and lunch purchased at the current rate because the actual cost to the district for each is more than we charge students. Increasing the price is the only way to ensure that we don't continue to lose money. The government reimbursement for students who receive free or reduced meals covers the entire cost of each of those meals. The price increase is designed to address and directly eliminate any further loss to the district on the meals for which students are paying full price. While there will be some effect if fewer students purchase lunch or breakfast, but that effect will be diminished by the equalization of cost versus the price students are paying.

So the federal reimbursement for free and reduced lunches equals the new prices other parents pay?

I am confused. According to this website: http://www.frac.org/html/federal_food_programs/programs/nslp.html
the federal reimbursement rate for free luches is $2.57/meal, for reduced price lunches it is $2.17 and for paid lunches is it .24

With these figures, high school students who pay full price bring in $2.74 ($2.50 plus the .24 reimbursement, free lunches bring in $2.57 and reduced bring in $2.42 ($2.17 plus the 25 cents paid. Wy didn't the district consider raising the reduced price to 40 cents and having full paying high school students pay $2.35 per lunch so with federal reimbursements, everyone would bring in an equal amount. Under the new pricing structure, full paying kids bring in more revenue than the free/reduced kids. If the federal reimbursement really covers the full cost for free/reduced luches at the high school level, why do the full paying kids have to bring in an even higher amount?

the admin reply said the reduced price could not be raised but when I checked out the website posted, it said districts could charge 40 cents. Could changing the reduced price from 25 cents to 40 cents help the deficit?

Sandra wrote:

I am confused. According to this website: http://www.frac.org/html/federal_food_programs/programs/nslp.html
the federal reimbursement rate for free luches is $2.57/meal, for reduced price lunches it is $2.17 and for paid lunches is it .24

With these figures, high school students who pay full price bring in $2.74 ($2.50 plus the .24 reimbursement, free lunches bring in $2.57 and reduced bring in $2.42 ($2.17 plus the 25 cents paid. Wy didn't the district consider raising the reduced price to 40 cents and having full paying high school students pay $2.35 per lunch so with federal reimbursements, everyone would bring in an equal amount. Under the new pricing structure, full paying kids bring in more revenue than the free/reduced kids. If the federal reimbursement really covers the full cost for free/reduced luches at the high school level, why do the full paying kids have to bring in an even higher amount?

A: The lunch prices were set following a stretch of board meetings at which a variety of proposals and scenarios were discussed. We have no plans to change the track we are on for the remainder of this year except to find ways to reduce our operating costs and use that to further reduce the deficit in this program.

Thank you for explaining the process for the lunch costs. At least hopefully parents will know that the school district could have chosen to raise the reduced rate from 25 cents to 40 cents and with the federal reimbursement rates for students who pay full price at the high school level, the full price students now bring in more revenue to the district than free or reduced lunches. I feel bad for the parents who are right on the edge of qualifying for assistance and hope that they will be able to handle the increase in their tight budgets. In a different response, the admin response talked about the stress of staff who could lose their jobs, what about the stress of families who will now have their tight budgets stretched even further?

I am a student at schenectady high, I don't find it right how people who get reduced lunch don't have to pay a little bitore, the school district is ,making students that pay full price pay 75 cents more that doesnt sound much but with parents that can barely afford the regular ammount for their childs lunch that costs 1.75 and can't get accepted into letting their child get free or reduced lunch isn't fair maybe they can afford it sometimes but uping the price isn't right..theres kid that get free and reduced lunches that don't even deserve it because half the time they use one of there other parents names that dont make alot of money so that they can get their lunch like that. it should be fair amount of price for everyone..most of that school can't aford alot , i unerstand that the economy is getting tight with money but to take it away from kids that need lunch isn't fair at all.Im a student that has to pay full price yeah my parents can afford the pay thats going up starting tomorrow, but i feel bad for all the students parents that can'tafford it now and not being able to still pass the paper that will excpt them to get reduced or free lunch, how do the people expect the ones who can't afford it bu still have to pay the new full price what are they going to eat? You guys see bad enough how are school is and the budgets we have it just doesn't seem right for the new change in price it just doesn't .

so is there a reason that the board decided to have full price students bring in more dollars than free/reduced kids? Can we at least find out why, even if the decision has been made already?

tjd wrote:

so is there a reason that the board decided to have full price students bring in more dollars than free/reduced kids? Can we at least find out why, even if the decision has been made already?

A: The board can only control the cost of local full price lunch and breakfast. The reimbursements from the government food program for free and reduced meals is not locally controlled.

HELLO i have 2 kids at schenectady high. I am very unhappy about the rise in prices. I am worried about the kids in the school that will not have money to eat and will go hungry.Is there nothing we can do about this and make sure our kids are not hungry.

SMITH wrote:

HELLO i have 2 kids at schenectady high. I am very unhappy about the rise in prices. I am worried about the kids in the school that will not have money to eat and will go hungry.Is there nothing we can do about this and make sure our kids are not hungry.

By law the schools must feed kids that are hungry , so they can get a free lunch. Although it is a PB&J sandwich and milk and fruit.