School Lunch Budgeting

Today's Washington Post features a poorly-titled front page story called Schools Get a Lesson in Lunch Line Economics about the cost of providing school lunches and the cost of not providing them well. It leaves out statistics about Loudoun County, so I thought I'd provide a few for you.

• Most Loudoun Schools serve both breakfast and lunch. Menus and prices are available online.
• Prices range from $1.30 for breakfast to $2:30 for lunch in Middle & High schools. Adults pay $3.20 for lunches.
• Breakfast meals, even at that inexpensive price, actually turn a profit for LCPS.
  
• The price of all full-price meals will increase $0.10 for the next school year.
  
• There is a separate line item in the Board of Supervisors budget to reduce the cost of lunches for all full-price meals. This year the amount is $900,000.
  
• Four kids eating lunch at school every day will cost their parents about $184 per month. The $0.10 increase pushes that up to $192.
• LCPS is the largest food service provider in the County, providing more meals to more people.
  

Note that the cost of the things that LCPS must buy (milk & bread are cited in the story) is increasing much faster than the 3% inflation that most folks like to reference. The same is true for most other items in our budget.

I have had lunch with my kids in their elementary cafeterias nearly every Tuesday for the past five years, and this year I have breakfast at a Middle School every Friday. By my count I am approaching my 200th meal at LCPS. I have seen significant improvements in the food quality over time, and I hope that the budget pressures will not reverse that trend. The food service workers will always have my thanks for how well they serve our kids.