[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 108 (Thursday, September 14, 2000)]
[Senate]
[Pages S8591-S8592]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Mr. LUGAR (for himself, Mr. Harkin, Mr. Craig, Mr. Leahy, Mr. 
        McConnell, Mr. Kerrey, and Mr. Grassley):
  S. 3054. A bill to amend the Richard B. Russell National School Lunch 
Act to reauthorize the Secretary of Agriculture to carry out pilot 
projects to increase the number of children participating in the summer 
food service program for children; to the Committee on Agriculture, 
Nutrition, and Forestry.


                     summer meals for poor children

  Mr. LUGAR. Mr. President, I rise today to introduce legislation to 
improve the summer food service program, which provides summer meals to 
poor children.
  On an average school day in 1999, nearly 27 million children received 
lunches supported by the national school lunch program. Of that total, 
over 15 million of these children were poor. Over 7 million children 
participated in the school breakfast program and more than 6 million of 
these children were poor. These statistics clearly show that the 
American people are generous and compassionate regarding the 
nutritional status of our children, especially poor children who may 
not have access to enough food at home.
  However, most of these poor children lose access to school lunches 
and breakfasts once the school year is over. The Federal Government 
does have programs to provide summer meals, but only about 22 percent 
of the poor children who get a school lunch also get a summer meal. 
Common sense tells us that children's hunger does not go on vacation at 
the end of the school year.
  Basically, children can receive federally subsidized summer meals in 
2 ways: through the summer food service program; or, if they are in 
summer school or year-round school, through the regular national school 
lunch and school breakfast programs.
  Summer school and year-round school students can get the regular 
school lunch and breakfast programs. Just as in the regular school 
year, students can receive free, reduced price or full price meals, 
depending upon their families' income. In July 1999, 1.1 million 
children received free or reduced price meals this way.
  The summer food service program was created to provide summer meals 
for children who are not in summer school or year-round school. The 
establishment of a summer food service program site depends upon a 
local entity agreeing to operate a site. At the local level, the summer 
food service program (SFSP) is run by approved sponsors, including 
school districts, local government agencies, camps, private nonprofit 
organizations or post-secondary schools sponsoring NCAA National Youth 
Sports Programs. Sponsors provide free meals to a group of children at 
a central site, such as a school or a community center or at satellite 
sites, such as playgrounds. Sponsors receive payments from USDA, 
through their State agencies, for the documented food costs of the 
meals they serve and for their documented operating costs.
  The program is targeted toward serving poor children. States approve 
SFSP meal sites as open, enrolled, or camp sites. Open sites operate in 
low-income area where at least half of the children come from families 
with incomes at or below 185 percent of the Federal poverty level, 
making them eligible for free and reduced-price meals. Meals and snacks 
are served free to any child at the open site.
  Enrolled sites provide free meals to all children enrolled in an 
activity program at the site if at least half of them are eligible for 
free and reduced-price

[[Page S8592]]

meals. Camps may also participate in SFSP. They receive payments only 
for the meals served to children who are eligible for free and reduced-
price school meals.
  At most sites, children receive either one or two reimbursable meals 
or a meal and a snack each day. Camps and sites that primarily serve 
migrant children may be approved to serve up to three meals to each 
child, each day.
  Participation in the SFSP and the summer portion of the school lunch 
program varies widely by State. Comparing the number of low-income 
children in summer programs to the number who get free and reduced 
price meals during the regular school year gives a reasonable measure 
of how well the summer meal needs of low-income children are being met. 
According to the most recent data supplied by USDA, only about 22 
percent of those children who received a regular school lunch also 
received a summer meal. Again according to USDA, participation ranges 
from over 53 percent in the District of Columbia to under 3 percent in 
Alaska. My home state of Indiana serves under 10 percent of these 
children.

  In August, I visited the successful summer feeding program 
implemented this year by the New Albany-Floyd County Consolidated 
School Corporation in Indiana. I discussed with community leaders ideas 
to encourage more participation in the program throughout my home 
state.
   Mr. President, hunger does not take a summer vacation. We need to 
examine new means of encouraging local entities to agree to offer the 
summer food service program in poor areas. In talking with program 
experts, a recurring problem they mentioned regarding the decision to 
enter the program was the amount of paperwork necessary to gain USDA 
approval.
  That is why we propose today legislation to provide a targeted method 
of increasing participation in those states with very low 
participation. This method will be tested for a few years to see if it 
is effective and, thus, should be extended to all states.
  Under current SFSP law, sponsors get a food cost reimbursement and an 
administrative reimbursement of the amounts that they document, up to a 
maximum amount. Based on the most recent data available, SFSP sponsors 
document costs sufficient to receive the maximum reimbursement over 90 
percent of the time. Some institutions (e.g., schools, parks 
departments) may not offer the SFSP because they do not want to put up 
with the administrative burden of documenting all their costs in a 
manner acceptable to USDA. Under the regular school lunch program, 
schools do not have to document their costs, but instead automatically 
receive their meal reimbursements. The extra paperwork burden of 
documenting all their costs may discourage sponsors from offering 
summer meals. Public sponsors, such as schools and parks departments, 
have to meet public accounting standards that make it unlikely that 
money meant for child nutrition could be siphoned off and used for 
unlawful purposes.
  My bill would establish a pilot project to reduce the paperwork 
required of schools and other public institutions (like parks 
departments) to run a summer food service program, and thus, hopefully, 
encourage more sponsors to join the program and offer summer meals. The 
bill would allow, in low participation states, public sponsors to 
automatically receive the maximum reimbursement for both food costs and 
administrative costs. In this way, the SFSP would be identical to the 
school lunch program.
  Low participation states would be defined as those states where the 
number of children receiving summer meals (compared to the number 
receiving free or reduced price lunches during the school year) was 
less than half the national average participation in the summer meals 
programs (compared to the number receiving free or reduced price 
lunches during the school year). This pilot program would run for 3 
years, FY 01 to FY 03.
  USDA would be required to study whether reducing the paperwork burden 
increased participation in the program. USDA would also be required to 
study whether meal quality or program integrity was affected by 
removing the requirement for sponsors to document their spending. 
Results of the study will be available for the 2003 child nutrition 
reauthorization.
  I urge my colleagues to support this legislation.
                                 ______