Dorothy Beverly of Chillicothe, Ohio
is a homemaker and the mother of seven children, ranging
from ages eight to 32. Five of Mrs. Beverly’s
children live at home—the three youngest are
still in school. Her husband is employed as a concrete
finisher, which is seasonal work and makes for some
lean times. Mrs. Beverly has suffered three heart
attacks and relies on expensive medication to treat
her condition, but has no health insurance.
The family’s budget is so tight that Mrs. Beverly
only purchases a few pills at a time rather than buying
a monthly supply. “One day at a time, or five
(pills) at a time so that I won’t waste money.
Very expensive. Got to decide if you’re gonna
eat or gonna live,” says Beverly.
Despite these difficulties, Beverly considers herself
blessed. One of the small everyday blessings comes
in the form of the free lunches three of her children
receive at school through the National School Lunch
Program, which has been helping low-income families
meet the nutritional needs of their children since
1946.
“It helps, believe me, every little bit helps.
Helps me make ends meet. If I had to pack a lunch,
I could not do it on a daily basis and every week,”
says Beverly.
A Benefit for All Kinds of Families
No matter what the income level of a family, the National
School Lunch Program can be a big help in smoothing
out the rough edges of the day. For families who don’t
have time to pack their kids a lunch each morning,
it helps that 95 percent of public schools offer the
meals —which must meet federal nutrition guidelines—to
all students. An estimated 28 million kids eat the
meals offered under the program at lunchtime, and
12 million of them pay the full price.
For families that cannot afford to provide their
kids with a lunch from home, the program’s offer
of free meals to children whose household income falls
below 130 percent of the federal poverty level, and
reduced-price meals (for about 40-cents) to those
whose family’s household income falls below
185 percent of the poverty level, can be a critically
important budget stretcher. (For the period July 1,
2002, through June 30, 2003, 130 percent of the poverty
level is $23,530 for a family of four; 185 percent
is $33,485.)
Who’s Eligible?
Right now, the process for determining who is eligible
for free or reduced-price lunch is pretty simple:
parents simply tell their local school what their
annual household income is, and a small sample of
families are then randomly chosen for verification.
A recent U.S. Department of Agriculture study concluded
that as many as 20 percent of the children receiving
free lunch under the current system don’t actually
qualify—a finding that led to some talk about
tightening rules, checking more families’ statements
about their income, or perhaps requiring families
to submit more paperwork.
However, the USDA conclusions have come under fire
from child advocates, who note that the authors compared
two different kinds of data—U.S. census data
and school district data—and that the data were
not from the same time period. Given that low-income
families tend to have fluctuating incomes, it remains
unclear if there really are significant numbers of
children receiving free lunch who don’t qualify.
When asked about the prospect of having to provide
more proof of income so that her kids could participate
in the school lunch program, Mrs. Beverly viewed it
as an added stress.
“If I had to go through a whole bunch of red
tape—why? When you’re hungry? It shouldn’t
have to be.”
Right now, there are no firm proposals on the table
to change the verification process for school lunch—or
make any other major changes in the program. Advocates
would like to see schools receiving more money in
reimbursements, so that meals could include more fresh
fruit and vegetables, and some would like to see an
end to the two-tier classification system, making
lunch free to all children from families with household
incomes below 185 percent of the poverty level.
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