← Truth in the Barrel
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- [00:00]
A
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- [00:32]
B
Welcome back everyone to another brand new edition of Truth in the Barrel, Devil's Cut. We aren't talking whiskey or bourbon today, sadly. We are talking about the super important topic of school lunches. I know, school lunches. Yes. Its value to our kids and society is way underrated. There's massive data out there showing that when kids are fed healthy meals, they learn more, they get better grades and they're overall just better students. So seriously, imagine trying to learn in grade school on an empty stomach. Unfortunately, that is still the case for many across the country and in Kentucky. But why? Today we're talking to a Kentuckian who made it her mission to make sure the kids of Jefferson county had what they needed to succeed. And we'll talk about how our country is helping and hurting kids in this area. Julia Boucher, former director of school and Community Nutrition services for Jefferson County Public Schools, is with us today. Welcome, Julia.
- [01:39]
C
Thank you, Amy. It's good to be here.
- [01:42]
B
Well, I want to start out and ask you a little bit about yourself. Are you from Louisville and how did you start out working in, you know, the, the business of school lunches and helping our kids?
- [01:57]
C
Yes. So yes, Amy, I am a native Louisvillian. I actually began my food service career in Blazer Cafeteria on the campus of the University of Kentucky. Eventually, I worked as a student supervisor. And while I was in graduate school, I went to work part time for a food broker in food service sales. So I got into the sales side of it and, and eventually worked for the Campbell Soup Company and finally for the Nabisco Company. I moved back to Louisville and one of my customers was Jefferson County Public Schools. And while I was calling on the coordinator of food procurement, she said, you know, I'm about to retire to spend more time with my grandkids and I think you'd be a great replacement. And ironically, I interviewed for the job right before the big snowstorm of 1994. So it took several weeks for me to get the official call had received the job. But I began that in 1994. I was coordinator of food procurement and I was responsible for menu planning Food and supply procurement, the catering program, and the USDA Commodity program. I did that job for five years and then went to work as the manager of, at the time, brand new central kitchen and warehouse, the Nutrition Service Center. I was manager of that facility for 10 years, overseeing food production and warehouse, and then I became the director of Nutrition Services in 2009 after my predecessor retired. I officially retired from school food service in 2021. But during that time with JCPS, I also had the privilege to serve on the nutrition committee for the School Nutrition association, which is the national professional association for. For school nutrition professionals. I also, during 2014-15, served as President of that organization. And one of my responsibilities was to advocate for school meals in Washington, D.C. calling on our elected senators and representatives, testifying about school meal programs before House and senate committees, and highlighting the importance of healthy school meals for kids.
- [04:22]
B
And just listening to your background there, you are like the nation's expert on this stuff. You know, I mean, I listen to all that. It's pretty amazing. Can you tell everyone how do these school lunch programs work? Is it different for every region? Different for every school?
- [04:43]
C
Different.
- [04:43]
B
Are there standards like, how does it work in Jefferson County?
- [04:47]
C
So there are actually a variety of programs. There's the National School Lunch Program, which provides lunch. There's the school Breakfast program, which provides breakfast. There's the supper program, which provides supper at schools. There's the CACFP snack Program that provides snack at schools. And there's the Summer Food Service program. These are available to school food authorities across the country. And many districts take advantage of all of those programs, just like JCPS did. So there are standards for the program which are national standards relative to calories and saturated fat, requirements for fruits and vegetables, et cetera. But there are some state requirements that vary a lot, which is becoming one of the increasing concerns for school directors. Because with the current focus on eliminating ultra processed food, a lot of states are passing bills that eliminate ultra processed foods without defining it, or if they define it, they may define it differently. They're also eliminating a lot of ingredients that may be harmful from foods. And that list of ingredients may vary from state to state, which makes it really difficult for manufacturers to produce products that meet all of these standards.
- [06:20]
B
I want to touch on something you talked about there. The standards being different, but also this desire for. And I think it's a good one to make sure that kids get healthy meals. You know, we just have this. I typically don't like the new secretary of, you know, Health and Human Services, RFK Jr. I don't think very much of him. However, there is a push, at least in the headlines, for kids to have healthier meals. I don't know how much the federal government is doing to that end. One of the things that I worry about is that we have these nutritional standards for healthier foods come down from above, but the cost of healthier foods is higher than the cost of not so nutritional food. And at the same time, Washington is cutting more money for these programs. So to me that it's hard for me to square that. But can you talk about that issue?
- [07:27]
C
Yes. So I would argue that school meals are the healthiest meals students receive. They're different than the meals they consume at home. They're definitely different than the meals that they get at fast food restaurants, or any restaurant for that matter. The USDA began to implement minimum nutrition standards in the mid-90s. And it was at that time that we decided to build the central kitchen and warehouse. Because as my former boss always said, before the central kitchen there were 140 different recipes for chili because every manager thought it needed more beef. Less beef, more spice. Less spice. And bringing production into the central kitchen for a lot of the key entrees ensured nutrition integrity, that the chili served at every school would be the same and we could assure parents and the community that this product meets the standard. The central warehouse also gave us the advantage of working directly with manufacturers to control food cost. We didn't buy everything directly from a manufacturer, but the very large volume items we bought directly from the manufacturer to control food cost. And you're right, the cost of healthy food is more now. USDA reimbursements have increased every year. Currently, the reimbursement for a lunch is $4.77 and a breakfast is around 269. Those rates go up every year, but they don't necessarily keep pace with the real cost of producing the meals that must be provided to every student. But also over the years, USDA has emphasized more fresh fruits and vegetables. Jefferson county was one of the leaders in Kentucky in terms of creating contracts with Kentucky farmers to buy products grown in Kentucky. And that expanded into beef and chicken. So we've always had an emphasis on healthy school meals. And I affirm that school meals are the healthiest meals that students have access to.
- [09:53]
B
Yeah, especially given all, everything else that's out there, McDonald's and all of these other, you know, that we're exposed to and that we go to. I often think, you know, how is it that kids. Well, I can't imagine going to grade school as a kid and being hungry or going there and having a meal that is not nutritious. I mean, we know, and this is where I want to ask you. We know there are studies out there that say that there's huge benefits from this. From a public policy perspective, can you talk about what benefits kids get and what society gets when we invest in kids here?
- [10:41]
C
So I think you mentioned a lot of the benefits in the introduction. They are, they're not hungry so they can focus on the learning that's occurring in the classroom. They have better attendance. You can't teach a child if they're not in school. That is critical. And they, they have better academic outcomes, higher performance. And as you stated, many, many studies have proven that. The other thing that USDA has done in the last 10 years is introduce a program called Community Eligibility which enables districts to serve free meals to all students. Jefferson county implemented that program around 2015 or 16. We started out with just 32 schools. It's a complicated formula to determine the schools that can participate, but we've been able to expand that program to all, all JCPS schools. So all JCPS students, regardless of their eligibility for free meals, get a free breakfast, free lunch. The supper program has always been free, as has been the summer food service program. So we ensure that students receive meals during the school year. And of course participation in that program has increased participation among the students, which means more students have access to those healthy school meals. And then we feed them after school if they're participating in an after school academic program or a sports program. And then when school ends in May, we feed them during the summer. JCPS typically has around 120 summer food service sites that include not only many of our JCPS schools but community sites. And USDA has begun to look at ways we can offer non congregate feeding, meaning that the kids don't have to stay on site to consume the meal. And I know in the last few years JCP had, JCPS has had at least three sites that can provide multiple days worth of meals to families for their students. And I think this is kind of an outcome of COVID You know, when schools were closed for Covid school food service workers showed up on the curb at practically every school in the district to pass out meals to families. Eventually we were enabled. We were able to pass out 10 days worth of meals to families at one time. And they kind of expanded that idea into the summer food service program because it's difficult for kids to get to a site every day. But if we can keep them nourished during the summer, again, they show up in the classroom in August ready to learn.
- [13:53]
B
I remember that during COVID going around Kentucky and seeing how the schools were dealing with COVID and that school meal program continued, and people would drive up and, you know, get the bag of their lunch and move on and it did. You see. Is this just something that happens in Jefferson county, or is this across the nation or across the state? Do every school district. Does every school district do it similarly?
- [14:27]
C
Yes. Yes. Not every district participates in the summer food service program. Some districts may not be able to recruit enough school food service employees to provide the program, or they live in districts where there's not as much need. And so there's no need, overwhelming need for those programs. But across the country, schools are participating in the summer food service program and the supper program. And again, these programs are vital, just like the school lunch program and the school breakfast program.
- [15:07]
B
You made a great point about these programs using local products from local farmers. It's all, you know, really well thought out by people like you. And I want to get into what has happened this summer at the federal level where we saw these ma, this big, beautiful bill, whatever you want to call it, this act that was largely voted on by pretty much all these Republicans, and with massive cuts to programs like Medicaid and snap. And does that affect the school lunch program at all? And if. If so, how it could.
- [15:57]
C
Because to participate in the community eligibility program, it's dependent on the number of students that are eligible or the percentage students that are eligible for free meals. That includes households that receive Medicaid and SNAP benefits. Those households have been categorically eligible for free meals for a number of years. So if you reduce the number of households that participate in those programs, you limit the availability of participating in a program like community eligibility, which provides free school meals to all students. Similarly, and that is one of the priorities of not only Jefferson county and school districts in Kentucky, but in school districts across the country, that school meals ought to be made available at no cost to all students all the time. When I did a lot of media interviews, I often said, you know, in my opinion, and most people share this opinion, school meals are as important as the bus ride the kids receive to school at no cost. The books and classroom resources they receive at no cost. If we all feed them, your education money is a lot more productive.
- [17:27]
B
Yeah. You know, and the worry that I have with these cuts to things like SNAP and Medicaid, and you laid it out really well, there is that, you know, when you, when you, you do that and you stop the sort of automatic enrollment as you talked about, what that means is that kids that really need these meals, their parents or their guardian would have to do more paperwork, right? More. More work to get in those programs at no cost. And correct me if I'm wrong here now. And also there's a lot of stigma associated with that. You know, you're a kid, you go to school, and now you have to do a bunch of paperwork to get free meals. I mean, what do the other kids know about that? I mean, this is the worry that I have. I have three children. They go to public schools. We have a system that is online, Julia, where I can put payments into their accounts, where when they go through the school lunch line, it go. You know, they're a number and they say their number and then it, you know, it gets ticked off of their account. So if they have $50 in their account and the school lunch is 450, you know, it's minus 450 that day. But I would imagine that there are kids on the free school lunch program that are also have that online account. And so there's no stigma there between the kids. You know what I mean, Julia? And so that's that. I worry about that too.
- [18:59]
C
Yes, the advent of online payment systems definitely decreased the stigma of school meals because prior to that, you know, students who were paid had to give the cashier money, and students that were free didn't ever exchange money, so they were generally easily identifiable. And then you had pay students that didn't want to eat at all because somebody might think if they were going through the lunch line, they were poor. And that is awful when the kid is afraid to eat. Because, you know, there are even students back when we had that program that were paid that couldn't afford it. And that's another thing that eliminating these programs. Kids have to eat. The students don't have the money, especially those students that fall in that reduced category where it's just 40 cents a day. But if you've got three kids and you've got 40 cents for lunch and 30 cents for breakfast, that adds up pretty quickly. They can't afford to pay. And we never turned a student away. If you came through the line, even if you were paid and you didn't have the money, you got a meal.
- [20:14]
B
Yeah, well, what is some. Go ahead, please.
- [20:16]
C
No, it's just important that every child receive that meal and that they not be embarrassed because they can't pay for it. But what happens is the district ends up racking up a lot of school meal debt. And that's another issue for districts across the country that don't have the ability to participate in the community eligibility program because they have a very low number of students that are eligible for free or reduced meals. The charges just soar. So again, school meals for everybody at no cost would be the greatest thing ever.
- [20:58]
B
Absolutely. And I think that we're sort of with, with these cuts, I worry that we're going in the wrong direction here. We, we have a system that is run by competent people like yourself, not perfect, that as you, you mentioned, maybe should be expanded to. To everyone. Yes. But I worry these cuts make it more challenging for school districts to help kids go to school and have healthy meals. Right now. What are some of the challenges that you ran into during your tenure all the way up to this point? And what are some of the biggest challenges you think going forward? What did you tackle in the 20 years and 30 years that you worked on this? And then what do we still need to do?
- [21:48]
C
Well, first of all, controlling food costs, supply costs, was always a challenge. It's something that you always have to keep your eye on. I think anybody that worked for me would tell you I was a numbers person. I was constantly looking at the performance numbers and making changes based on that performance. That is one. This problem has eased a little bit lately, but enough labor to produce school meals, especially as we move more towards scratch cooking. You don't have a lot of people that grew up learning how to cook. They didn't cook alongside their moms in the kitchen. And school kitchens don't have the equipment anymore to produce some of these meals. I know as we transitioned to the central kitchen, we removed a lot of the kettles and bain Marie's and equipment like that that had mixers that were utilized in this schools because we made room for bigger serving lines or power soap sinks, other equipment because we were doing so much of the food production at the central kitchen. Again, and we. You've got a lot of districts across the country where the school kitchen is a closet. You know, some that central kitchen delivers meals to the school. They're served that day or the next day and they don't have any equipment at all. So that, that is a challenge. Controlling the paid meal debt was also a challenge, which I am grateful they no longer have to worry about. But again, as you mentioned, cuts and snap in Medicaid could impact the district's ability to participate in that program. So it's really, really tricky.
- [23:56]
B
Yeah, it is. And we don't really know what's going to happen. I mean, we see this massive cuts in federal funding to these programs, and, you know, that what's going to happen is that the cost is going to shift onto the states and into local communities. And, you know, many some local communities, I would imagine, would be able to to, you know, make up the difference, but many will not. And that's where you're going to see our fellow Kentuckians, their kids, our fellow Americans and kids fall behind in those areas, I think.
- [24:30]
C
Yes. And Amy, I don't have the exact numbers in front of me, but if you look at what USDA federal government spends on school meal programs nationwide throughout the year, it is a minuscule amount compared to what we're spending on some other programs. And again, a small investment in healthy school meals means a better outcome in our education programs. It improves the impact of every dollar you spend on education.
- [25:09]
B
We'll get Doug or Bill, our producers here during this during the show here to get that number of how much money is spent on school programs nationwide. I'm guessing it may even be less than the White House new East Wing there that he tore down, but we'll get that and add that in. What are some misconceptions about these programs that you might want to respond to? One I thought was when I was reading through the material that you have written before is that the school lunches of today are not the same as what you and I had back 20, 30, 40 years ago. That would be one misconception. It seems like it's a lot better. There's a lot more choice, a lot more the taste is better. But are there any other misconceptions about these programs?
- [26:06]
C
Well, when I began my career in 1994, there was still such a thing as a type A lunch. We were still able to order butter as one of our USDA commodities. So and, you know, I think people think we receive a lot of cheap government commodities, and that's not the truth at all. That program has done definitely improved over since 1994 because now we can process commodities. So school districts can send beef or chicken or cheese and other commodity products to processors to produce products that are healthy. I think the other miss that's the main misconception, that school meals just aren't healthy and they're just, yeah, garbage. And that couldn't be further from the truth. I I was very proud of the school meals we served when I retired, and I can tell you that the current director is doing an amazing job at expanding, you know, the menu, offering different ethnic types of foods, which we did a little bit, but really focusing on how to satisfy all of the taste buds of our students. So school meal programs are very exciting and fun. I often said I had the best job in the world because you can't do anything greater than feed kids. And I also often said that anytime I was having a very difficult day or a hard day, I could turn it right around by going out to school and having lunch with second graders, because they're amazing.
- [27:52]
B
That's great.
- [27:53]
C
Yeah.
- [27:54]
B
And I want to make sure that people know that these. These programs for school lunches, they really help our country. The cost of it is $17.7 billion nationwide of federal funding. Now, that may seem like a lot. That is not much. And when you look at, like. Like the military budget, folks, is. Is like 950 billion. Okay? That is like a sliver of the military budget. Our budget for immigration enforcement right now, which has just skyrocketed. Whether you like it or not, we're pumping a ton of money into this is something above 300, $350 billion. So when you're talking 17 billion, that's a big bang for your buck. In my belief, for helping our kids and helping our kids go into the future, I also think it's a moral obligation. Right. When people say, well, America can't afford to do this. Yeah, can we can afford to feed our kids at school. This is a moral obligation, and it's important for our country.
- [29:02]
C
And if we don't make it a priority to feed them, they're going to have poor health outcomes again, poor education outcomes. I mean, they are our future. We'll all be depending on them one day to run our country and our economy. And I can't think of anything more important than making sure that they're healthy.
- [29:25]
B
Well, I really appreciate you coming on and talking about this. It's such an important issue, and I feel like we don't talk about it enough. It's one of these things that we need to keep protecting. We need to keep expanding because. Because it's something that is important for our kids, for Americans, for our society, for our economy, and it makes sense. So thank you for coming on and talking about this.
- [29:50]
C
Thank you so much for having me.
- [29:59]
D
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