Due to a cumbersome verification process, Santa Barbara Unified School District students missed out on 300,000 free breakfasts in the 2017-2018 school year.
Under a new administrative requirement, students must enter an identification code before receiving breakfast. The change led to long lines of students waiting for access, and resulted in many of them not having time to eat before school.
For the first time, the district had to lend money from its general fund — a total of $606,000 — to supplement a deficit in the district’s Food Service Fund.
“I have been here since 2008 and this is the first general fund contribution the district has had to make,” Meg Jette, assistant superintendent, told district trustees last week.
She said the change in the system occurred after five of the district’s elementary schools were “re-benched.” If a school’s socioeconomic disadvantaged student percentage changes by more than 5 percent, the federal government requires each student to enter an identification number to ensure he or she is still eligible for the free meal.
To be reimbursed for the meals, the district must submit the number served to the federal government. If the number of reported meals is down, the reimbursement is lower, too.
In 2018-2019, seven school sites were re-benched — three high schools and four elementary schools — resulting in a loss of approximately $332,106. The district did not disclose which schools were reclassified.
The matter arose at Tuesday’s school board meeting, with trustees expressing concern that students did not have enough time to eat.
“I feel like there must be something we can do,” board member Kate Ford said. “It shouldn’t be happening.”
Board member Laura Capps said the problem was one of bureaucracy and the district should find a way to fix it.
“Whenever I see a government problem, I want to try to find a solution,” she said. “This one is such an obvious one. If you are doing this to verify your numbers, you are actually harming us and sending us in the wrong direction.
“It’s the wrong goal of the entire program.”
Jette said she had no answers.
“I have to be more knowledgeable about what is causing that 5 percent variance,” she said.
— Noozhawk staff writer Joshua Molina can be reached at jmolina@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.
