Results tagged “child nutrition” from EdLabor Journal

For millions of families, the meals their children receive at school or in child care are their only chance at a healthy meal all day. In 2008, more than 16 million children lived in homes without access to enough nutritious food. America's children should not have to go hungry -- they should have access to healthy foods year round that will help them thrive physically and academically.

The Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 (S. 3307) will dramatically improve children?s access to nutritious meals, enhance the quality of meals children eat both in and out of school and in child care settings, implement new school food safety guidelines and, for the first time, establish nutrition standards for all foods sold in schools.  This legislation will answer President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama's call to reduce childhood hunger and support school and community efforts to reduce childhood obesity.

The legislation:

Improves Access

• Increases the number of children enrolled in the school meals programs by using Medicaid data to directly certify eligible children. This provision will connect approximately new 115,000 students to the school meals program.
• Enhances universal meal access for eligible children in high poverty communities by using census data to determine school wide income eligibility. 
• Provides more meals for at-risk children nationwide by allowing Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP) providers to be reimbursed for meals provided to low-income children after school. This provision will provide an additional 21 million meals annually. 
• Provides funding for innovative state and local projects to address childhood hunger and promote food security for low-income children.  
  

Increases Focus on Nutrition Quality and Children's Health

• Improves the nutritional quality of school meals by increasing the federal reimbursement rate for school lunches for districts who comply with federal nutrition standards. This additional 6 cents per meal will be the first real reimbursement rate increase in over 30 years.
• Removes junk food from schools by applying nutrition standards for all foods sold in schools.
• Promotes nutrition and wellness in child care settings by establishing nutrition requirements for CACFP.
• Connects more children to healthy produce from local farms by helping communities establish farm to school networks, create school gardens and use more local foods in cafeterias with $40 million in mandatory funding. 
• Strengthens local school wellness policies by updating existing requirements, increasing transparency, providing opportunities for community involvement, and compliance measurements.
• Supports breastfeeding for low-income women by supporting data collection in WIC and permanently authorizing performance bonuses for exemplary breastfeeding practices at WIC clinics and agencies.
  

Improves Program Management & Program Integrity

• Supports schools' food service budgets by ensuring charges to school foodservice accounts are only for allowable expenses.
• Supports a skilled workforce by establishing professional standards and training opportunities for school food service providers. 
• Streamlines program administration by giving CACFP providers greater flexibility with their administrative funds and eliminating duplicative paperwork requirements and wasteful monitoring practices. 
• Increases efficiency and modernizes the WIC program by transitioning to an electronic benefit program.
• Improves food safety requirements for school meals by improving recall procedures and extending existing HACCP requirements to all places where school meals are prepared or served.
  

Fully Paid For -- At No Cost to Taxpayers

• Saves $1 billion over 10 years by extending a provision that allows the Secretary of Agriculture to count commodities purchased for market stabilization toward the required level of federal support (in the form of commodity foods) for the National School Lunch Program.
• Saves approximately $1.3 billion over 10 years by restructuring nutrition education in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) into a new grant program that distributes Federal funds by formula to the States. 
• Saves approximately $2.2 billion over 10 years by eliminating a temporary SNAP benefit increase provided by The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA).     
  

This week, the House is expected to vote on S. 3307, the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act, the child nutrition reauthorization legislation that has already passed unanimously in the Senate. The legislation would dramatically improve the quality of meals children eat in school and in child care, increase the number of healthy meals available to needy children and provide the first real increase in the Federal reimbursement rate for school lunches in over 30 years. The legislation would also eliminate junk food from schools by requiring schools, for the first time, to apply nutritional standards to food served outside the cafeteria.

Listen to Chairman Miller, Speaker Pelosi and other legislators discuss the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act on a November 29 press conference call.   

This week is National School Lunch Week (October 11-15), as proclaimed by President Obama:

"No child should have to learn on an empty stomach.  Nearly 65 years ago, America made protecting the health of our children a national priority by developing the National School Lunch Program.  This groundbreaking program has prevented hunger and promoted education by enabling our young people to have access to safe, balanced, and affordable meals at school.  It has also supported their development, encouraged their learning capacity, and instilled life-long healthy habits.  This year, during National School Lunch Week, we recognize the vital importance of this historic program, and we recommit to serving meals that will contribute to the health and well-being of a new generation."

...

"NOW, THEREFORE, I, BARACK OBAMA, President of the United States of America, do hereby proclaim the week of October 10 through October 16, 2010, as National School Lunch Week.  I call upon all Americans to join the dedicated individuals who administer the National School Lunch Program in appropriate activities that support the health and well-being of our Nation's children."

The Committee passed the Improving Nutrition for America’s Children Act (H.R. 5504) on July 14, 2010 to dramatically improve children’s access to nutritious meals, enhance the quality of meals children eat both in and out of school and in child care settings, implement new school food safety guidelines and, for the first time, establish nutrition standards for all foods sold in schools.

As children return to classrooms to begin the new school year, nutrition advocates are speaking out about child nutrition legislation before the House of Representatives. The Improving Nutrition for America’s Children Act was passed by the Education and Labor Committee in July and would greatly increase access to school meal programs, both during school and in after-school and community-based programs.

Vicki B. Escara, President and CEO of Feeding America, published an op-ed in the Huffington Post urging passage of Chairman Miller’s bill. She wrote:

“… for low-income families who struggle to overcome hunger, back-to-school season brings an end to the strain of putting additional meals on the table when the free and reduced-price school breakfasts and lunches are unavailable.”

…

“Every child in America should have enough to eat regardless of the season -- summer, fall, winter or spring. Children need access to nutritious food year-round, so why shouldn't the programs that serve them be able to operate year-round? With a gap of nearly 17 million children unserved by summer feeding programs, we ought to do everything we can to make it easier for food banks and other community-based providers to reach children in the summer. Passage of Chairman Miller's child nutrition bill is an important first step to making sure no child goes hungry next summer.”

José Andrés, an internationally-known chef and owner of ThinkFoodGroup, also commented on the need to pass childhood nutrition legislation in a column published in the Atlantic:

“The lunch ladies, the administrators, the people who feed our kids want to do better. But they are limited by one thing: a lack of money. The federal government spends about $2.51 per child per day to feed them lunch. Out of that you have to pay for labor, facilities, and administrative costs, leaving about a dollar for food. Imagine trying to feed yourself a nutritious meal every day with only a dollar. Very difficult. Now imagine trying to do that while satisfying the picky palate of a typical school kid.

“Right now, we have an opportunity to change that. Every five years, Congress takes another look at the issue when the Child Nutrition Reauthorization Act is voted on, opening the door for discussion about possible improvements to these programs as well as increased funding. Among other things, the CNR provides money for and sets nutritional guidelines school for school lunch programs. Every five years it comes up for renewal. It is the most important piece of legislation that no one has ever heard of.”

The Improving Nutrition for America’s Children Act increases the federal reimbursement rate for the first time in 30 years.

Vicki B. Escarra, President and CEO of Feeding America, has a post at Huffington Post about why the House Child Nutrition Bill is Better for Children.

She said:

The House Education and Labor Committee approved a strong bill in July, the Improving Nutrition for America's Children Act of 2010 (H.R.5504). This bill includes many of the same improvements to nutritional quality as the Senate bill but does far more to invest in increased program access. The House bill would significantly increase access to food at breakfast, after-school, on weekends, and during the summer. Children need access to food every day, before, during, and after school, and the House provides much-needed improvements to address these gap periods.

The Improving Nutrition for America’s Children Act of 2010 pays particular attention to increasing access because hunger doesn't take a summer vacation or stop at the end of the school day.

Specifically, the Improving Nutrition for America's Children Act improves access to school meal programs by:

• Increasing the number of eligible children enrolled in the school lunch programs by using Medicaid/SCHIP data to directly certify children who meet income requirements without requiring individual applications and requiring states to establish and execute a plan to increase rates of direct certification.
• Providing enhanced universal meal access for eligible children in high poverty communities by eliminating paper applications and using census data to determine school wide income eligibility.
• Increasing children’s access to healthy school breakfasts by providing competitive grants to school districts to start up or improve their program.

It also improves access to out of school meal programs by:

• Ensuring fewer children go hungry year round by providing meals for over 225,000 children through seamless meal service for children in school based and community based summer and after-school programs, and in low income rural areas. 
• Improving access for children in home-based child care by reducing administrative costs for sponsors of child care meal programs.

Learn more about the Improving Nutrition for America’s Children Act of 2010.

As schools return from their summer break, many students will again have their only chance at a healthy meal all day. And those meals are key according to a new report by Georgetown University Assistant Professor of Public Policy Peter Hinrichs. 

According to the Associated Press, Mr. Hinrichs said:

"The research found that the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) has not had a dramatic effect on health into adulthood, but it has had a significant effect on educational attainment," Hinrichs said. "The NSLP today is still broad in its reach, but it targets poorer children. There are higher standards for eligibility and also special funding for poorer schools. Had these elements been in place at the inception of the program, there may have been a more detectable effect on health in its early years."

That is why under H.R. 5504, the Improving Nutrition for America’s Children Act of 2010, the program increases the number of eligible children enrolled in the school lunch programs by using Medicaid/SCHIP data to directly certify children who meet income requirements without requiring individual applications and requiring states to establish and execute a plan to increase rates of direct certification. It also provides enhanced universal meal access for eligible children in high poverty communities by eliminating paper applications and using census data to determine school wide income eligibility. The more eligible students who are having a regular, nutritious lunch the more students will be performing in the classroom.

The bill passed out of committee and is awaiting a vote on the House floor. 

Learn more about H.R. 5504, the Improving Nutrition for America's Children Act of 2010.

The Portland Press Herald published an op-ed this morning about the importance of reforming the Child Nutrition Act: Overweight recruits hurt our military readiness and national security.

They say:

Being overweight or obese is the leading medical reason why young Americans cannot join the military. Over the last 30 years, child obesity rates have tripled. One study found that 80 percent of children who were overweight at ages 10-15 were obese at age 25.

Here in Maine, 41.2 percent of youths from ages 18 to 24 are overweight or obese. In addition to hindering our military preparedness, obesity also costs the American people billions in medical expenses every year.

From the mid-1990s to 2000, the state of Maine spent $375 million per year on obesity-related medical expenses. This data is 10 years old -- Maine's current expenditures are surely much higher today.

What can we do to address the problem? One way is to improve the quality of food and beverages served in our schools. The school environment is critical for shaping the eating and exercise habits of our youth.

...

The White House has proposed additional resources for a robust child nutrition reauthorization package that would reduce child obesity and improve the diets of children. Current proposals in the House and Senate include provisions that will raise the quality of all foods and beverages served in schools by requiring the secretary of agriculture to establish new nutrition standards that are consistent with the most recent Dietary Guidelines for Americans.

"Mission: Readiness" strongly supports these provisions and urges Congress to enact reauthorization legislation immediately.

By applying increased nutritional standards to all foods sold on school grounds, expanding access to healthier meals, and supporting schools in implementing proven programs that educate children and their families about healthy eating and exercise, we can get junk food and high-calorie beverages out of schools and out of our children's daily diets.

Recent research provides strong evidence that receiving school meals can help low-income children maintain a healthy weight.

Watch Major General Paul D. Monroe, U.S. Army (Ret.) of th Executive Advisory Council of Mission: Readiness, testify at a hearing about H.R.5504, Improving Nutrition for America's Children Act on July 1, 2010 after the jump.

(This is a guest blog post by Rep. Lynn Woolsey, Education and Labor Committee Member.)

It’s been 30 years since the regulations limiting junk food sales in schools were updated, despite big changes in nutrition science.‪

Today, 23 million children and adolescents are obese or overweight.‪

Obesity rates for children between 6 and 11 years old have more than tripled over the last 40 years. ‪

Throughout their lives, these children are at greater risk for heart disease, Type 2 Diabetes, stroke, cancer, and social and psychological problems.‪

One of the most important ways to help fight this epidemic is to ensure that higher quality, more nutritious foods are sold throughout the day in our schools.‪

This is why I have introduced H.R. 1324, the Child Nutrition Promotion and School Lunch Protection Act, which requires that all foods sold in schools throughout the entire school day are based on the most current nutrition science.‪

This bill has 170 cosponsors and has been endorsed by over 90 public health, school, food and beverage industry, and nutrition groups, including the American Beverage Association, General Mills, and the American Heart Association.‪ I am pleased that this language has been included in Chairman George Miller's (D-CA) H.R. 5504, the Improving Nutrition for America’s Children Act.

This provision does not affect school parties or foods sold during sporting events or band concerts in which parents are present. It only regulates foods sold in schools, and allows USDA to exempt foods sold as part of fundraisers. It’s also important to realize that schools that are switching to selling healthier foods and are not losing revenue.‪

Studies by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Centers for Disease Control, and the Center for Weight and Health at U.C. Berkeley found that the majority of schools switching to healthier foods in their vending machines and a la carte lines actually increased their total revenues.

‪In other words, it is a win-win situation for schools—healthier students and a healthier bottom line as well‪‪

The AP has a story this morning about how fewer hungry children are getting free summer meals.

Mary Clare Jalonick reports:

Hungry children looking for a free meal this summer may not be able to find one.

States and cities have cut funding for summer meal programs as need has skyrocketed, according to a new report from an anti-hunger group that tracked the program in 2009. Budget woes that have left many families hungry are also affecting local governments that find themselves without the needed dollars to feed children while they are out of school.

"Low-income children across the country clearly bore the brunt of budget cuts," said Jim Weill, president of the Food Research and Action Center, which compiled the report to be released Tuesday.

Summer nutrition programs aim to feed children who get most of their nutrition — or sometimes their only real meal of the day — at school. The food research group measures the effectiveness of those summer programs by comparing the number of low-income children receiving meals during the summer with those receiving free and reduced-price school meals during the school year.

One reason why Chairman Miller is pushing so hard for the Improving Nutrition for America’s Children Act of 2010 is because children shouldn't go hungry. This bill would, among other things, improve access to out of school meal programs by ensuring fewer children go hungry year round by providing meals for over 225,000 children through seamless meal service for children in school based and community based summer and after-school programs, and in low income rural areas. It will also improve access for children in home-based child care by reducing administrative costs for sponsors of child care meal programs.

The Committee will hold a hearing on H.R.5504, Improving Nutrition for America’s Children Act on Thursday at 9:15 ET. We invite you to watch via our live webcast.

The Contra Costa Times highlights a problem that many communities face as schools finish for the year.

Thousands of Contra Costa County children are eligible for free or reduced-price lunches during the school year. But come summer vacation, many of them no longer have access to regular meals.

"During the summer, they don't have that program and the resources of families are stretched," said Barbara Jellison, food services director for the West Contra Costa Unified School District. "I don't think they get the nutrition that they need."

Chairman Miller's Improving Nutrition for America’s Children Act of 2010 addresses this problem directly. It would ensure fewer children go hungry year round by providing meals for over 225,000 children through seamless meal service for children in school-based and community-based summer and after-school programs, and in low income rural areas.

Learn more about the Improving Nutrition for America's Children Act of 2010.

The Improving Nutrition for America’s Children Act (H.R. 5504) will dramatically improve children’s access to nutritious meals, enhance the quality of meals children eat both in and out of school and in child care settings, implement new school food safety guidelines and, for the first time, establish nutrition standards for all foods sold in schools.

Supporters of H.R. 5504 include:

• 4C Council of Santa Clara County
• 9to5, National Association of Working Women
• Action for Children North Carolina
• Action for Healthy Kids
  
• Advocates for Better Children’s Diets
• Advocates for Children and Youth, Maryland
  
• Afterschool Alliance
• Alberts Organics
• America SCORES
  
• American Academy of Pediatrics
• American Association for Health Education
  
• American Beverage Association
• American College of Preventive Medicine
• American Commodity Distribution Association
• American Dental Association
  
• American Diabetes Association
• American Dietetic Association
• American Farmland Trust
  
• American Federation of Labor – Congress of Industrial Organizations, AFL-CIO
  
• American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees
  
• American Heart Association
• American Humane Association
  
• American Public Health Association
• American Rivers
  
• American School Health Association
• American Society of Bariatic Physicians
• Association of Schools of Public Health
• Association of State & Territorial Public Health Nutrition Directors
• Association of State Nutrition Network Administrators
• Audubon California
• Audubon Dakotas
  
• BJ Enterprises
  
• B.J. Jordan Child Care Programs
  
• Bread for the World
• California Association of Food Banks
• Alameda County Community Food Bank
  
• Food Bank at Contra Costa and Solano Counties
• Redwood Empire Food Bank
• San Francisco Food Bank
• California Association of Nutrition & Activity Programs C-A-N –Act
  
• California Center for Public Health Advocacy
• California Climate and Agriculture Network
• California Farmers Union
  
• California Food Policy Advocates
• Camp Fire USA
  
• Campaign for Better Nutrition
  
• Campaign to End Obesity
• Catholic Charities USA
  
• CDI/CDC-Choices for Children
• Center for Rural Affairs
• Center for Environmental Health (CA)
  
• Center for Science in the Public Interest 
• Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
• Central Valley Children's Services Network, Child Care Food Program
• Chesapeake Wildlife Heritage
  
• Child & Family Resources, Inc.
• Child Care Council
  
• Child Care Development Services, Inc.
  
• Child Care Food Program Roundtable
  
• Child Nutrition Initiative
• Child Nutrition Program of Southern California
• Child Welfare League of America
  
• Childhood Obesity Prevention Coalition
• Children First for Oregon
• Children Now
  
• Children’s Alliance
• Children’s Alliance of New Hampshire
  
• Children’s Campaign, Inc.
  
• Children’s Council of San Francisco
• Children’s Defense Fund
• Church Women United of New York
  
• Citizens’ Committee for Children of New York, Inc.
  
• Coalition on Human Needs
• Community Action Partnership
• Community Alliance with Family Farmers (CA)
  
• Community Bridges Child & Adult Care Food Program
• Community CROPS (NE)
  
• Community Food Security Coalition
• Community Health Partnership: Oregon’s Public Health Institute
  
• Concord Child Care Center
• Connecticut Farmland Trust
• Connecticut Forest and Parks Association
• Conservation Law Foundation
  
• Consumer Federation of America
• Contra Costa Child Care Council
• Defenders of Wildlife
  
• Department for Professional Employees, AFL-CIO
• Directors of Health Promotion and Education
  
• Early Care and Education Consortium
• Emergency Food Bank of Stockton/San Joaquin
• Environmental Defense Fund
• Environmental Working Group
  
• Escondido Community Child Development Center
  
• Family Resource & Referral Center
• Farm Aid
  
• Farm Fresh Rhode Island
  
• Feeding America
• First Focus Campaign for Children
• Fixing School Food Alliance Monterey Bay
• Food Bank for Monterey County
• Food for People
  
• Food Lifeline
  
• Food Marketing Institute
• Food Research & Action Center
• FoodLink for Tulare County, Inc.
• Foodways Alliance (AZ)
  
• FRAMAX, CACFP Sponsor
• Go For Health! Collaborative of Santa Cruz County
• Hunger Action Los Angeles
  
• ICNA Relief
• ICNA Council for Social Justice
  
• Inter-Faith Ministries
• Interfaith Council of Amador
  
• International Federation of Professional & Technical Engineers, AFL-CIO, CLC
  
• International Institute of Los Angeles
• International Union, United Automobile, Aerospace & Agricultural Implement Workers of America, (UAW)
• Islamic Circle of North America
• Izaak Walton League of America
  
• J.C. Family Home Association
  
• Jewish Council for Public Affairs
• Kansas Action for Children
• Land Stewardship Program
• Land Trust Alliance
  
• Lawyers Helping Hungry Children
  
• Lean & Green Kids
• Learning Care Group, Inc.
  
• Leopold Group, Iowa Sierra Club
  
• Louisiana Upgrading Nutrition for Children's Health (LUNCH Program)
  
• Love Little Children, Inc.
• Maine Children’s Alliance
  
• Mayor Bloomberg, New York
  
• MAZON: A Jewish Response to Hunger
• Meredith Matthews East Madison YMCA
  
• Metropolitan Council on Jewish Poverty
• Michael Fields Agricultural Institute (WI)
  
• Michigan Land Use Institute
• Michigan’s Children
• Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy
  
• Minute Menu Systems
• Mission: Readiness
  
• Montana Dietetic Association
• Montana Farmers Union
  
• Monterey County Office of Education Food & Nutrition Services
• Montgomery Countryside Alliance (MD)
• Montgomery County Community Action Development Commission (PA)
• Mount Adams Resource Stewards (WA)
  
• National Advocacy Center of the Sisters of the Good Shepherd
• National Association for the Education of Homeless Children and Youth
• National Association for the Education of Young Children
• National Association of Conservation Districts
  
• National Association of County and City Health Officials
  
• National Association of School Nurses
• National Association of Sport & Physical Education
• National Audubon Society
• National Catholic Rural Life Conference
• National Catholic Social Justice Lobby
  
• National Center for Appropriate Technology
  
• National Consumers League
• National Council of Jewish Women
• National Council of La Raza
  
• National Family Farm Coalition
  
• National Farm to School Network
  
• National Farmers Union
  
• National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty
  
• National Parent Teacher Association
• National Research Center for Women & Families
  
• National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition
• National Wildlife Federation
  
• National WIC Association
  
• National Women’s Law Center
• Natural Resources Defense Council
  
• Nemours
• New England Farmers Union
• New England Small Farm Institute
  
• New Mexico Voices for Children
  
• New York Coalition for Healthy School Food
  
• New York State Healthy Eating and Physical Activity Alliance
• North Dakota Dietetic Association
• Northeast Organic Farming Association – Connecticut
• Northeast Organic Farming Association – Massachusetts
• Northeast Organic Farming Association – New Hampshire
• Northeast Organic Farming Association – New Jersey
• Northeast Organic Farming Association – New York
• Northeast Organic Farming Association – Vermont
  
• Northern New Mexico Stockman’s Association
  
• Northwest Harvest
• Occidental Arts and Ecology Center (CA)
  
• Ohio Ecological Food and Farm Association
• Ohio Farmers Union
• Oklahoma Composting Council
  
• Oklahoma Fit Kids Coalition
  
• Oklahoma Institute For Child Advocacy
  
• Options Child Care Agency
  
• Oregon Hunger Task Force
• Organic Farming Research Foundation
  
• Partners for a Healthy Nevada
  
• Partners for a Hunger-Free Oregon
  
• Partners for Sustainable Pollination
  
• PATCH, Hawaii
  
• Pennypack Farm and Education Center (PA)
• Pesticide Watch Education Fund (CA)
  
• PHFE/Angels Child Care Food Program
• Pollinator Partnership
• Prairie Rivers Network
  
• Prevention Institute
  
• Public Health Foundation Enterprises – WIC
  
• REAP Food Group (WI)
  
• RESULTS/RESULTS Educational Fund
• Revolution Foods
• River City Food Bank
  
• Roots of Change
  
• Sacramento Hunger Coalition
  
• St. Joseph’s Family Center
• St. Mary’s Center
  
• Salt Lake Community Action Program
  
• Save the Children
  
• School Nutrition Association
• School’s Out of Washington
  
• Schuyler Center for Analysis and Advocacy
  
• Seacoast Eat Local (NH)
  
• Second Harvest Food Bank of Santa Clara and San Mateo Counties
  
• Second Harvest Food Bank, Santa Cruz County
• Service Employees International Union
• Shape Up America!
  
• Share our Strength
• Shasta County Office of Education
  
• Society for Nutrition Education
• Sodexo Foundation
• South Carolina Wildlife Federation
  
• South Dakota Voices for Children
  
• Soyfoods Association of North America
  
• Stone Barns Center for Food & Agriculture (NY)
  
• Sun-Maid Growers of California
• Sunnyvale Community Services
  
• Sustainable Northwest
  
• The Alliance to End Hunger
• The Cherokee Nation
• The Nature Conservancy
  
• The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine
  
• The Ranchers Stewardship Alliance (MT)
  
• Trust for America’s Health
  
• U.S. Apple Association
• Union of Concerned Scientists
  
• Union Station Homeless Services
  
• United Fresh Produce Association
• United Way Silicon Valley
  
• Utah Farmers Union
  
• Utahns Against Hunger
• Virginia Association for Biological Farming
  
• Voice for Utah Children
  
• Voices For America’s Children
• Voices for Georgia’s Children
  
• Voices for Illinois Children
  
• Wallace Center at Winrock International
• Washington Child Nutrition Reauthorization Coalition
• Washington Sustainable Food & Farming Network
  
• Western Region Anti-Hunger Consortium
• WhyHunger
  
• Wild Friends Program (NM)
  
• Wisconsin Council on Children and Families 
• World Wildlife Fund
• Women, Food and Agriculture Network
• Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation
  
• Your Care Plan

Chairman Miller met with celebrity chef Rachael Ray yesterday to discuss the upcoming reauthorization of the child nutrition laws. Child nutrition reauthorization is a top priority for Chairman Miller and he plans a full reauthorization this year. He is committed to increasing children’s access to the healthy foods, improving nutrition quality, and to make it easier for schools and community based organizations to provide the nutrition programs that children need.

Take a peek behind the scenes at their meeting:

Fitness expert Richard Simmons teamed up with U.S. Reps. Ron Kind (D-WI), Zach Wamp (R-TN), George Miller (D-CA), chair of the House Education and Labor Committee, and representatives from the American Heart Association, Sporting Goods Manufacturing Association, and the National Association for Sport and Physical Education to celebrate the passage of the Fitness Integrated with Teaching (FIT) Kids Act at a press conference Thursday, April 22 at 11:00 a.m. at the House Triangle.

CNN has video of some of Richard Simmon's comments.

The FIT Kids Act, which passed the House of Representatives on April 21, 2010, renews the emphasis on physical education in schools.  The Act would work to ensure kids are active during the school day and are taught to be personally responsible for their health.  As a leading advocate for passage of the FIT Kids Act, Simmons spoke about his findings from the 200 days he spends on the road each year, visiting schools and communities across the country.

Yesterday, Chairman Miller attended a round table meeting led by Michelle Obama about how to end childhood obesity.The San Francisco Chronicle reports that he said the first lady will bring "great credibility and great ideas" to a campaign that will include a major rewrite this year of the multibillion-dollar federal nutrition program, including school lunches and breakfasts.

"We have an opportunity to do something dramatic," Miller said.

The first lady said the effort will focus on four areas: improving health at schools, increasing children's physical activity, improving access to healthy food and making it more affordable to poor children - a challenge she described as difficult - and teaching people to make better choices about what they eat.

After the meeting, Chairman Miller issued this statement about ending childhood obesity.

“Nothing is more important than our children’s health, but for too many families, healthy meals fall to the wayside as they struggle to make ends meet.  Our nation’s school meal and child nutrition programs provide millions of children with nutritious meals and help them develop healthy life habits – and will be critically important in the fight against childhood obesity. As we work to rewrite our child nutrition laws this year, we must focus on eliminating any barriers to these programs, so that all eligible children have access to healthier foods and nutrition education whether in school, child care, or at home.

“Improving child nutrition and tackling childhood obesity will be a challenge, but no one is better equipped to take it on than our First Lady. She has already done wonders to raise public awareness of the benefits of gardening and healthy eating and I applaud her for choosing this as her first key policy initiative. I look forward to working with the First Lady on this initiative and am committed to working with my colleagues in Congress on a bipartisan, comprehensive reauthorization of our child nutrition laws.”

Below Chairman Miller talks about his apple "theft" from the White House meeting with the First Lady and how excited he is to work with her to end childhood obesity.



The Education and Labor Committee has jurisdiction over federal school meal and afterschool meal programs, the Special Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC), and community-based programs such as the summer meals program and the child and adult care food program.

Today, the House is expected to vote on the Agriculture Appropriations Conference Report which includes temporary extensions of expiring provisions of the laws governing the child nutrition programs resulting in a cost savings of $150 million. These savings will be reinvested to meet critical child nutrition needs across the country to ensure more children have year-round access to healthy and nutritious meals at school, in child care settings, and during the summer months.

Ensuring More Children Have Access to Healthy and Nutritious Meals

ENSURING IMPROVED ACCESS AND QUALITY OF MEALS FOR ALL CHILDREN

Children should not have to go hungry – and they should have access to nutritious foods that will help them thrive physically and academically. In this difficult economic climate, the federal child nutrition programs have an increasingly important role to play in providing children with healthy meals while at school, childcare, or during the summer months. Over 32 million children each year are served by these programs. For many children, these meals may be the only healthy foods they receive during the day.

Research shows that children who are hungry have a harder time paying attention and learning in the classroom. Low-income children are also at greater risk of going hungry or becoming overweight, during the summer months. Providing children with access to healthier, nutritious foods at school, child care, summer programs, or other educational settings is vital to our efforts to help all children learn, succeed and grow.

To ensure that children can continue to benefit from these programs and services, Congress will temporarily extend expiring provisions of the Child Nutrition Act until a more comprehensive reauthorization of the law occurs next year. This one-year temporary extension will generate a savings of $150 million, which will be reinvested to meet critical child nutrition needs across the country. These new investments will address President Obama’s and Congress’ priorities to end hunger and improve child nutrition, increase access to quality school meals, and build program capacity.

On Thursday, October 9, 2009, the House Subcommittee on Healthy Families and Communities held a hearing to examine innovative strategies to ensure children have access to healthy, nutritious and safe school meals.

Visit the hearing page for the full list of witnesses.

Today's front page story in the USA Today about a recent GAO audit is recommended reading. The audit is in response to an investigation request by U.S. Senator Richard Durbin (D-IL), and U.S. Reps. George Miller (D-CA), Rosa DeLauro (D-CT), and Carolyn McCarthy (D-NY).

The USA Today says:

Federal agencies that supply food for 31 million schoolchildren fail to ensure that tainted products are pulled quickly from cafeterias, a federal audit obtained by USA TODAY finds.

The delays raise the risk of children being sickened by contaminated food, according to the audit by Congress' Government Accountability Office.

In recent recalls, including one this year in which salmonella-infected peanut butter sickened almost 700 people, the government failed to disseminate "timely and complete notification about suspect food products provided to schools through the federal commodities program," the audit says.

Such alerts sometimes took more than a week to reach schools, "during which time (schools) unknowingly served affected products."

Chairman Miller said, “Ensuring that all children have access to healthy and nutritious meals during the school day is vital to our efforts to help all children learn and succeed. Every possible effort must be made to make sure that the foods served to our schoolchildren are safe to eat. As we work toward reauthorizing the school meal programs, it is clear that further actions must be taken to strengthen the communications, planning and procedures needed to prevent recalled or contaminated foods from entering our cafeterias.”

We recommend you read the entire USA Today article, Democratic lawmakers' statements, and the GAO report.

The USA Today ran a story yesterday about the increasing demand for school lunches during this economic downturn.

Nearly 20 million children now receive free or reduced-price lunches in the nation's schools, an all-time high, federal data show, and many school districts are struggling to cover their share of the meals' rising costs.

Through February, nationwide enrollment in free school lunch programs was up 6.3% over the same time last year, to 16.5 million students, based on data from the U.S. Food and Nutrition Service (FNS), which subsidizes the programs. Participation in reduced-price lunch programs rose to 3.2 million students, the data show.

...

Preliminary school lunch data for March suggest that February's record demand may be dipping slightly. Still, Congress should give "serious consideration" to boosting the federal subsidy during the reauthorization this fall of the Child Nutrition Act, says Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., who chairs the House Education and Labor Committee. "For millions of children, this is the nutritional safety net."

This increased demand and other issues related to child nutrition were raised at the hearing regarding improving child nutrition programs to reduce childhood obesity on May 14, 2009.