Tell the Trump Administration: Don't cut kids off school meals!

Federal Advocacy Update

Tell the Trump Administration: Don't Cut Low-Income Students' Access to Free School Meals

Just as six million CA schoolkids are headed back to school, The Trump Administration has proposed new, misguided, rules for SNAP/CalFresh that would sever the seamless connection to free school meals for students in many SNAP households. If enacted, USDA estimates that over 500,000 young students would be cut off from the free school meals that help them stay prepared and focused at school to achieve their academic goals.

In California, tens of thousands of K-12 students could lose access to free meals, causing a ripple effect on school district budgets under the state's educational funding structure ( Local Control Funding Formula) , which targets resources to schools based partly on the percentage of students receiving free or reduced priced meals. The cuts would also mean thousands of schools that serve, or are planning to serve, universally-free meals under the Community Eligibility Provision could lose eligibility for the program or make it financially unsustainable.

Universally free school meals are particularly important in California where the cost of living and operating a business are extraordinarily high. When breakfast and lunch are served free to every student, the entire school benefits from the elimination of school meal debt, the supportive meal environment that eliminates stigma, and the increase in federal resources that can be put back into the quality of the school meal programs.

In addition to the impact on school meal enrollment, USDA estimates the rule would cut 3.1 million people off of SNAP , the vast majority working families, seniors, and people with disabilities. In California, that would mean 230,000 or more low-income households would lose access to CalFresh.

Learn more here, and by reading the recent article from EdSource, "School lunch could be slashed for thousands of California children under new proposal."

Take Action Today! Your Voice is Needed to Protect Healthy School Meals for Students in Low-Income Households

1) Submit public comments in opposition to the proposed rule.

CFPA has drafted CA-specific model comments that you can customize to your organization's specific mission, geographic region, and population served. Please also feel free draft your own comments. Comments must be submitted by Monday, September 23rd to be counted.

Short model comments from CFPA. doc

You can submit your comments directly to the Federal Register, or through the online comment portal set up by our partners at the Food Research & Action Center.

2) Learn more about Categorical Eligibility and who it helps.

Read our California partners' joint statement on the proposed rule to cut off benefits from tens of thousands of Californians struggling to make ends meet and put food on the table.

Learn more about how Categorical Eligibility works and who it helps from our partners at the Center on Budget & Policy Priorities and the Congressional Research Service.

3) Please stay tuned for updates on how you can help protect SNAP/CalFresh.

CFPA will be sharing updated impact data and populations-specific model comments soon. Make sure you don't miss any updates by signing up for our Action Alerts.

Questions? Contact Jared Call jared@cfpa.net

Para leer esta publicación en español, haga clic aqui.

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Your Input In Action

Want to see how input from last year's survey shaped CFPA's priorities for 2019? Take a look at our current federal, state legislative, state administrative, and policy research agendas.

Questions? Contact Tia Shimada tia@cfpa.net