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September 2008 |
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Leaner times cook up fatter prices |
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Friday, 02 May 2008 |
As the cost of food for school lunches climbs, school administrators look for ways to trim fat from budgets.
 Sherry Zhao, 6, a kindergartener at Centennial Elementary School picks up her lunch tray Wednesday. (Staff photo/Karen Campbell)
By KAREN CAMPBELL
Staff Writer
Drawing big chugs of milk from their straws together, two first-graders say the dairy product is their favorite part of their school lunch.
As the best friends eat heaping spoonfuls of cheesy mashed potatoes and chicken nuggets, Emma Bertram and McKayla Applegate, students at Centennial Elementary School, talk about some of their other favorite cafeteria foods — pizza and hamburgers.
They said they always buy their meals at the school.
School districts across the county, as well as the country, are looking for ways to cut their costs with the price of food on the rise. Most of students’ favorite items would not change, but something may have to so the school district can make ends meet, Wapakoneta City Schools Food Services Supervisor Lori McKean told the Wapakoneta Daily News.
“We are contemplating an increase next year,” McKean said. “Food prices are the worst they have been in 10 years.”
She said she expected to have a proposal for the school board’s approval by the May or June board meeting. She wanted to wait until revenue tallies for the current school year were as accurate and complete as possible.
Not only is McKean looking at the possible increase of lunch prices, but also at other ways she can cut expenses from her already lean budget.
“We’re trying not to put the entire burden for increased costs on the consumer,” McKean said. “Just like the prices families are seeing in the grocery store and probably will be seeing soon in restaurants, costs for food are increasing and we have to find a way to compensate for that.”
School lunches in the district cost $2.10 for elementary students, $2.25 for middle school students and $2.35 for high school students.
McKean said so far the district has not seen too many increases in food costs because of a contract locked in with Gordon Foods, but with a new contract due to be signed in July, what additional costs the district sees could depend on how negotiations go.
The district was providing better quality produce, but extra fuel charges already have forced the district to look elsewhere for those items.
“Almost all vendors, from milk to produce, are adding fuel charges,” McKean said. “You either see the increasing cost there or in the price of food.”
Soaring grocery prices across the country are being felt in school cafeterias, forcing many districts to alter menus and consider raising prices next year.
Increasing fuel costs are one reason districts are being forced to raise their prices, but those costs have been compounded by higher labor costs and higher costs to provide health food items to meet new local and state school nutrition standards as well, according to a report from the School Nutrition Association.
Staples like milk, cheese and bread saw double-digit price increases last year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service. In January, the federal government reported a nearly 5 percent hike in food prices nationwide compared to the previous year.
School meal programs, which rely heavily on federal and state subsidies already operate on slim margins and schools don’t have the option of taking government-mandated items like milk off the menu, leaving schools with less options for cutting costs, said a spokeswoman with the School Nutrition Association.
Alexis Steines, of the association’s Washington office, said that means districts can try to get more creative and serve less pricey options, but for most, raising prices of meals is the only way to compensate.
School districts are reimbursed for school meals at a rate that is adjusted every year. Currently, the federal school lunch program reimburses all districts 23 cents per regular priced meal, and $2.47 and $2.07 per meal for free and reduced lunches, respectively.
School lunch programs are expected to be financially self-sufficent, relying on revenue from paid school meals and federal reimbursements, instead of the general school district budget, according to the School Nutrition Association. While providing quality, affordable meals to students, food service departments must balance nutrition requirements, student preferences and financial obligations.
McKean said she’s seeing the steepest increases in items such as milk and eggs.
McKean estimated that milk alone has caused her budget to increase by $20,000 this school year.
Milk has gone from 5 cents last year to 22 or 23 cents a pint this year. Miscellaneous items, such as diced eggs used on the high school salad bar, have increased by $10.
Cooking items from scratch also can cost in both ingredients and labor, but McKean said most of that already has been limited to one or two times a week.
“Most everything we cook is convenience,” McKean said. “It comes out of a box or a can and doesn’t require preparation.”
She said the district will continue to look at how it can modify labor, which accounts for 55 to 60 percent of the budget, and changes may be made to the popular a la carte lines.
Different options being considered include less dish washing and more disposables. While a certain number of staff must be maintained, McKean, who already reduced food service staff from 55 to 44 since she took the job, said not filling slots when someone leaves and more centralized food preparation also could be considered.
“What we don’t want to do is get behind the game,” McKean said. “We don’t want to reach a deficit. Right now, we’re barely holding our own. With labor costs rising 3 percent each year, benefits and food going up, revenue doesn’t really increase that much from year to year.
“We’re trying our best,” she said. “Our employees are working hard for the kids, providing good, nutritious meals so they can learn. We hope we can get through this rough time.”
Waynesfield-Goshen Local Schools administrators also may consider raising prices, but that decision would be left up to the board, cafeteria supervisor June Horn said.
“Some of our prices are higher,” Horn said, specifically mentioning pizza, cookies, milk and paper products.
“I understand with gas prices the way they are, they have to make it, too,” Horn said of the companies charging those higher rates.
She said one of the most important strategies her staff plans to look at is concentrating meals on what students will eat, rather than what they will throw in the garbage.
“We don’t plan to do anything fancy, just stick to the basics,” Horn said.
She said if food prices keep increasing, that may be when they need to look even harder at ways to counteract that, such as raising meal prices, which now are $1.50 for elementary students in the third grade and younger and $1.75 for all other students.
Horn said her kitchen, which she helps with is staffed with two head cooks and three part time employees.
Horn said they also don’t use a lot of prepacked items and instead cook more from scratch.
She said it doesn’t take any longer or cost any more in staffing than if most of what they did was just heat the food.
In her five years overseeing the department, Horn estimated that this year prices increased the most, by 10 to 20 percent.
Other districts in the county face similar struggles.
Donna Kantner, food service manager for St. Marys City Schools, said she expects bakery prices to go up based on increasing fuel costs affecting not only delivery, but the cost of ingredients such as wheat and corn used to make the items.
She said while schools across the nation have been forced to make substitutions when faced with rising costs, so far St. Marys hasn’t been forced to take that option. Kantner said that is something she would prefer to avoid as food services continues to work toward meeting the district’s wellness policy.
St. Marys plans to increase lunch prices by 5 cents next year. Elementary students are expected to pay $1.90 and high school students $2.10 for a regular meal and $2.30 for a premium meal when the new prices take effect.
Food costs at Minister Local Schools could increase 7 to 10 percent next year, estimated head cook Martha Kuether, who said the items that may increase are staples in the lunches.
Kuether said her distributors have warned of possible increases in items such as pizza, canned goods, fruit and meat.
The prices students pay for school lunches at New Knoxville aren’t expected to increase for at least a year, until after renovations are complete, said the district’s food service director Sherry Zwiep, who said no matter what rates are the district will still make money on its lunches just as it has been.
Elementary students pay $1.55 for lunch and junior high and high school students pay $1.65.
Zwiep said she watches costs closely.
“If something costs too much,” Zwiep said, “I switch to something else.”
Staff writer Kay Louth contributed to this story. |
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Last Updated ( Friday, 02 May 2008 )
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| | ...I love the "small town" charm and sense of community I feel when I run into my father at Community Market or my Mother-in-Law at Walmart or one of my sisters at the gas station! Tracy Anderson - Wapakoneta
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