SACRAMENTO >> SB 138 — approved in Assembly Appropriations on Friday — would expand free and reduced breakfast and lunch for hundreds of thousands of students on Medi-Cal.
According to Sen. Mike McGuire, who championed the bill, California has more children in poverty than any other state in the nation, with nearly one in four kids going hungry each day. There are more kids in poverty here in the Golden State now than there were prior to the recession.
He believes the time is right for California to broaden the reach of school meals.
SB 138 — the “Feed the Kids Act” will address childhood hunger by removing a layer of bureaucratic red tape from the state school meal program enrollment process and by serving all students in very high poverty schools for free.
“When a child goes to school hungry, their ability to learn, grow and thrive is compromised,” McGuire said. “School meals help fight the devastating effects of childhood hunger and improve outcomes in our public schools, yet so many kids who need to eat, aren’t being provided free school meals — and it’s time that changes.”
The legislation would develop a universal enrollment process by ensuring that all school districts utilize Medi-Cal data to seamlessly enroll income-eligible students in free and reduced-price school meals. Currently, most districts do not use Medi-Cal data to automatically enroll students.
The bill will automatically enroll income-eligible students who are on Medi-Cal onto the free and reduced lunch program at their school, therefore increasing the number of kids receiving free and reduced lunch.
The California Department of Education believes an additional 650,000 elementary, middle school and high school students would start receiving school meals under this new and efficient certification process.
SB 138 will head to the Assembly floor in the next two weeks.
