The Blaine County Education Foundation plans to cover the cost of lunches for qualifying low-income students at local public schools.
On Tuesday, the Blaine County School District Board of Trustees voted unanimously to accept the donation during its regular meeting. Rather than a set dollar amount, the donation will be ongoing; the Foundation will receive a monthly invoice from the district for meals purchased by qualifying students.
The gift will help make up for the expiration of the federal government’s COVID-19-related free meal waiver, which covered the cost of food for students during the pandemic. In August, the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced that it would no longer provide free meals to all students through the waiver program.
Education Foundation Executive Director Kristy Heitzman told the Express that the revoking of the waiver drove the BCEF to take action. After the Department of Agriculture ended the free lunch waiver, Heitzman said that many families stopped receiving federal meal support. Federal guidelines require that families meet earned income categories to qualify for free and reduced-cost meal support. According to the Education Foundation, many local families make more in annual income than federal guidelines allow, yet still struggle financially with high grocery prices and cost of living in the Wood River Valley.
“The criteria is based on a national average, and doesn’t take into account the high cost of living in our valley, which we know is already high,” Heitzman said. “That’s why we started working with the district and began to discuss ways we could address this issue.
“Although many families who applied did receive support, few families received the reduced-cost meal support, which would be 30 cents for breakfast and 40 cents for lunch. This can still be $119 a year per student.”
The community has come together to donate $70,000 to the initiative so far, she said.
“The BCEF has received generous donations from the community,” Heitzman said. “It just goes to show what an amazing support structure we have in our community.”
Although the Foundation has gathered a substantial amount of money from community donations, it has set a goal to raise $150,000 to completely cover the 250-plus students who receive reduced-cost lunch support.
“We are hoping to raise enough funds to cover all the families who qualify for reduced meal support,” Heitzman said. “We began raising funds in September, and we have reached out to different businesses and donors and my goal is to raise $150,000 this year to help those families this year but to also have funds available for next year on an ongoing basis.”
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Once again, the WRV community comes through. Per BCSD, over 600 students qualify for federal meals support. With the additional 250 mentioned in this article, it seems that almost 30% of the kids in the BCSD need help to afford school meals.
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