 Good morning. Good morning. Good to see you. I've sent her to a column or had to go to a house ad. It's a funny campaign. It's a weirdo's crying. We'll just be crying. Yeah. I mean, you could have gone. I couldn't. Yeah. So he'll be along tonight. And then in a few minutes, we'll be spending beyond 10 minutes to explain the ad. So it's Thursday, April 6th, and we're going to talk a little bit about universal school meals. And we have Rosie Kerber with us. Good morning, Rosie, and welcome to the committee. I'm actually going to suggest that Ledge Council go first if you want to talk specifically about H165 to walk you through that and then I can answer your question. Well, that's Beth from the council. Yes. Are you new there? Yeah, I joined last session. So this is my second session. Second session. Well, welcome to the ad committee. Thank you. And glad to have you. So H165. And so are you going to run through it? Sure. Beth St. James office of legislative council, whatever you want, I can walk you through it at whatever level you'd like me to do. We have Irene who's fine and rich so we don't have to be a super low level, but sort of a medium type. Okay. I mean, we've been pretty well educated from our local school officials, but yeah. Sure. So the committees that usually appear do not like me to share the screen. Do you want me to share my screen or do you all have a copy of the bill in front of you? Great. So you should have H165 as passed by the house, both on your website. And maybe it looks like you all have it in front of you. Great. Section one is a finding section. The findings are actually the same as the bill that passed last year. Do you want me to walk through the findings or do you want me to jump to the meat of the bill? In less specific questions. Great. So we're going to jump to section two, which technically begins at the bottom of page two on line 19, but really only with some headings there. So the first thing this bill does is it adds some language to the school foods programs sub-chapter in chapter 27 and title 16. And you all know title 16 is the education chapter. I'm sorry, title. And so sub-chapter two is all of the school food programs language. And so the first amendment this bill makes is to section 1261A, which is the definition section for the sub-chapter. And the amended language actually appears on, or the additional language actually appears on page three. So on line 11, adding a subdivision four, a definition of approved independent school just for this sub-chapter. And that's really just to make sure it's clear that it's only for independent schools physically located here in Vermont. That's really the only reason we're adding that definition here. The previous bill or the previous law did not fell right out of us. Yes. So you can see up above there, there is a definition in subdivision three on line eight there of independent school board. But this, when it comes to the independent, or comes to the universal meals program, those universal meals supplements, which you'll see is the next defined term here, are only going to be available for schools located in Vermont. Technically approved independent schools under current state law could be located outside of Vermont. That's clarified. Yes. So the next term, which is a really big term for this bill, is on line 14, subdivision five, which is adding a definition of the universal meal supplement. So rather than repeating this language all throughout the bill, we're just going to be using the word universal meal supplement, which means the reimbursement amount paid by the state for the cost of a paid breakfast or lunch under the federal school breakfast and federal school lunch programs. And for illustration purposes, we'll just look at the breakfast definition. It's exactly the same for lunch on the next page, just substituting lunch for breakfast. So for breakfast, the universal meal supplement is a sum equal to the federal reimbursement rate for a free school breakfast, less the federal reimbursement rate for a paid school breakfast, using rates identified annually by the agency of education from payment levels established annually by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. So that is what the state is going to be reimbursing per meal. And on page four, subdivision 3B there is the same definition for lunch. We can just note that the word lunch is substituted for breakfast, but the analysis is the same. So the next amendment this bill makes on page four, line six, is to section 1262A, which is the award of grants section in the school food program. And everything above this added language, so it's adding a subdivision E, is where those asterisks are, is the language that's in current law for how schools are reimbursed for free and reduced price meals. Well, for reduced price meals, the state picks up the tab for students' meals. And so that language appears above that subdivision E, as well as some additional language regarding when the state may offer funds to schools related to the school food programs. So for the purposes of this bill, we're just adding a line here. Subsection E, universal meal supplements shall be awarded in accordance with section 4017 of this title. And then 4017 of this title that we see in a couple pages is a brand new section that we're adding to address the reimbursement for this program. And we're adding it not to the school food sub-chapter, we're actually adding it to the education funding chapter of title 16. Yes. And once we see that language, I'll talk about what that means for adding it to that specific part of title 16. It does actually have a significant meaning. And then the next change here is on line 11, section 1264. This is the language kind of enabling the food program. So the food program section. So you'll see there's additional language here on line 18. So in addition to operating to offering a school food program to children who qualify for free or reduced price meals under the federal meals programs. After operating a public school, shall cause to operate within each school district, the same school breakfast and school lunch program made available to students who qualify for those meals under the federal laws there. We're going to move on to page 5 for each attending student every school day at no charge. So public schools shall offer free meals to all students at no charge. And then on line 1 on page 5 to address independent schools, it reads an approved independent school operating a school lunch and school breakfast program made available to students who qualify for those meals under the federal school food programs shall offer the same to each attending student every school day at no charge in order to qualify for the universal meal supplement. For approved independent schools they can under the federal meals programs operate the federal meals programs in the schools but they don't have to. So if they do and if they want to take advantage of the universal meal supplement which will get into how they're reimbursed and what they are reimbursed for then they have to offer free meals to all students every day at no charge. So for public schools it's a shall and for approved independent schools it's a may. And then subdivision C here is some language to help schools, some ideas to help schools to achieve the highest level of participation in students actually taking these meals. So in operating a school breakfast and lunch program a school district and an approved independent school shall seek to achieve the highest level of student participation which may include any or all of the following. Providing breakfast meals that can be picked up by students making breakfast available to students in classrooms after the start of the school day for school districts collaborating with the school's Wellness Community Advisory Council in planning school meals and a school district and an approved independent school shall count time spent by students consuming school meals during class as instructional time. So those are all that's a may. Those are not shall. Those are ideas to help schools maximize student participation in the meals program. So that's pretty much how it operates today. It may be that would be a great question for Rosie but it may be that this is something that's already happening often. So then we're going to move on to page six. So the next change program subject here is a repeal of section 1265. So in current law there is an exemption for public schools to participate in the food meals programs. This whole section is the process they would go through if they don't want to participate in the federal school meals program. This section is actually suspended for this current school year for the meals program that's last year. And so this bill would repeal this section altogether which would essentially again force public schools to operate a federal meals program. And then we are moving to page seven the universal meal supplement awards. So here is that here is the new section that I mentioned earlier. So we're adding a section in 40 to title 16. We're adding section 40-17 and this would be the universal meal supplement. So this is adding a section to chapter 133 which is the state funding of public schools chapter in title 16. It's the last chapter there. It's where all of the ed fund language is. So we're going to refer back subsection A here for the purpose of this section universal meal supplement has the same meeting as that term in subdivision 1261A five of this title. That's the definition we walked through at the very beginning of the bill. And then we're going to address this kind of in two parts. We're going to talk about public schools and then we're going to talk about approved independent schools. So for public schools from state I'm online 14 page 7 from state funds appropriated to the agency from the education fund for the universal meal supplement the agency shall provide a universal meal supplement for the cost of each meal actually provided to each student in the district during the previous quarter when meals are offered to all students at no charge pursuant to the language we just walked through in that school food program section. Reimbursement from state funds shall be available only to districts that maximize access to federal funds for the cost of the school breakfast and lunch program by participating in the community eligibility provision or provision 2 we're on page 8 of these programs. That online 20 that maximizes access. Yes. I know we talked about that earlier in the session who's going to determine if a school district has maximized their efforts in collecting these federal dollars. I guess Rosie or we can ask that question later. Well there is a little bit of language that helps here so if we keep reading online too so they have to maximize federal funds using either the community eligibility provision or provision 2 any other federal provision that in the opinion of the agency draws down the most possible federal funding for meals served in that program. And at the start of each school year the agency of education may require that a school food authority requesting the universal meal supplement begin a new cycle of the relevant federal provision and group sites in a manner the agency determines will maximize the drawdown of federal funds so it's the agency of education. On line 8 subdivision 2 there, second breakfasts which are allowed under the federal meals programs I believe they're called excess breakfasts do not qualify for reimbursement under this subsection so one school breakfast provided for students. Line 10 a non-profit pre-qualified private pre-kindergarten provider that is qualified pursuant to subsection 829 C of this title which is the pre-kindergarten statute and is not also an approved or recognized independent school is eligible for the universal meal supplement under this subsection if it operates a food program under a public school school food authority. There's a little bit to unpack there. So what we're talking about here or what you think of as a child care provider. So not an independent school that's also running a pre-k program but a day care center that qualifies for Act 166 funding for universal pre-k funding. If they operate a federal meals program and if they do so under a public school school food authority which is kind of the umbrella under which all of these programs operate and they're all over the state in different configurations then they can take part in this universal meal supplement program for their students. So I have a question there. Do most private day cares operate a food program under a public school food authority? I'm going to refer to I'm going to suggest you ask Rosie that question but no. So for three and four year olds if the school district has a contract with private providers they're offering child care that it sounds like to me that that's the group that would be eligible. Yes it's a little different. So under section 829 under a universal pre-k kindergarten program now public schools can run a pre-k program and if the public school themselves has a pre-k kindergarten program they automatically qualify as part of a public school. Burlington I think a majority of the kids in the Burlington school district they've contracted with private child care providers to perform that function. The way I'm reading is those privates that have contracted with the school district Yes so maybe so it's not a contract so the way the universal pre-k program works now is private pre-k kindergarten programs have to be pre-qualified and they have to meet certain requirements under AOE rules and DCF rules okay parents can go to any program they want so the school district does not have to actually contract with specific programs if a program is pre-qualified under those rules is qualifies then the parents can send their kiddos anywhere with the exception that the law does allow for geographic for a school district to place geographic limitations on where those Act 166 dollars can go and I can't speak to where those if anyone's using those geographic limitations but for example in Burlington if there are no geographic limitations then a family could choose to use their Act 166 funding in any pre-qualified pre-k provider and if those pre-qualified pre-k providers operate a school food program number one and two they operated under a public school food authority then they would qualify for the supplement so maybe most childcare providers are eligible for supplemental food grants and I'm not sure how that fits with this that would be a great question for the agency there is a whole another federal meals program that the agency would be far better equipped to speak to that child care centers can fit under so they could qualify for kind of two they could operate one under one program or under the school food program that we're talking about here when we're talking about lunch and breakfast in your pre-k through 12 schools but this language is specific that if it's so if the pre-k program is pre-qualified if they offer the federal meals program and if that federal meals program is under a public school food authority then they would qualify for this and I do not believe right now that's very many programs at all if I got anything wrong you can correct me approved independent school so that's the public school program for approved independent schools it's very similar with some different language to account for the differences between the private schools and the public schools so from state funds you'll see we're on page 8 subsection C line 15 line 16 from state funds appropriated to the agency from the to the agency from the education fund for the universal meal supplement the agency shall provide a universal meal supplement for the cost of each meal actually provided to each qualifying student on public tuition so the state is only going to reimburse meals for those publicly tuition students at approved independent schools but the approved independent school has to offer free meals to all of their students provided that and so here's some language that's applicable just to the approved independent schools we're on page 9 if the approved independent school participates in the food programs as a site the public school school food authority the public school school food authority shall be reimbursed only for students attending the approved independent school on public tuition and if the approved independent school participates in the community eligibility provision or is in a year other than the base year of provision too the school shall provide the agency with the number of students attending the school on public tuition and the total number of students enrolled in the school the agency shall the agency shall calculate the percentage of students attending the school on public tuition and multiply that number by the paid student percentage the results of which shall be the number of meals the school shall be reimbursed for so this is how the agency is going to figure out in those particular situations in the CEP program or in the anything other than the base year of provision too how are they going to figure out how many meals to reimburse the school for so subdivision two here is the same second breakfast don't count for reimbursement subdivision three this is getting at pre-k programs in an approved independent school so students attending an approved independent school on public tuition shall include a pre-kindergarten child if the approved independent school also qualifies as a pre-qualified private provider then the child school district of residence pays tuition to the school so if this is not the day care setting this is the private school with a pre-k program again only those students attending on Act 166 funds are going to qualify for those meals and again just like in public schools or on online 20 here on page 9 an approved independent school for the universal meal supplement only if it operates a food program that makes available those meals free to every student attending everything and then the same language here in subdivision five on maximizing access to federal funds it's the same for it's the same walk-through on public schools subdivision D here is a little bit repetitive I don't think it needs to be here but there was a consensus that for clarity's sake so someone doesn't need to flip back and forth between different sections of Title 16 perhaps actually adding the definition of universal meal supplement at the very end of this section would be helpful so this language in subdivision D is just the definition of universal meal supplement and that's it for universal meals and so I just wanted before we get into the local foods and send of grant which is the end of the bill and it'll be quick that by putting that language that we just walked through in Chapter 133 of Title 16 it's an allowable use of the education fund kind of automatically because one of the provisions in that chapter talks about allowable uses of the education fund and there's a little bit of a catch-all that says or other programs in this chapter and that would include things like transportation reimbursement and special I think there's a referral to special education funding there's some other programs that kind of I think JFO doesn't like this term but kind of comes off the top of the education fund kind of automatically so by plunking this language in that chapter it's an it's automatically an allowable use of the education fund if you and if I don't know how familiar you are with this but if you if you appropriate funds from the education fund and it's not an allowable use of the education fund and if you don't not withstand a specific section there's a they call it the nuclear option there's an automatic repeal of the property tax so we don't want that to happen or maybe you do but this bill does not do that so that's the that's the specialness of putting this language in that chapter I don't think any of us know local foods incentive grant program this is the last section of the bill before the effective date this is a part of the school foods program sub chapter in title 16 it is you'll see everything that's not underlined is current law so this is a program that currently exists it's relatively new it started I believe in 2021 and it allows schools to current law allows only public schools to qualify for some grant money if they are a certain part of their school foods program comes from locally sourced foods what locally sourced means is spelled out in the statute the only change here is including approved independent schools who are eligible to receive the universal meal supplement is being eligible to participate in this program and so you'll see lots of cross-outs where it said a school board we're replacing that with the term an eligible entity and then all the way on page 16 everything between page 11 and 16 is current law with the change of crossing out a school board and we're replacing that with an eligible entity then you can see on line 9 subsection E the definition of eligible entity means supervisory union or supervisory district so the public schools or an approved independent school operating a food program that qualifies for the universal meal supplement pursuant to section 4017 and so that's the only change to this program just adding approved independent schools that are getting the universal meal supplement and then the effective date of this act right now is July 1, 2023 were there any questions in regards to this changing the supervisory unions to eligible entities is there any discussion in the other committees or maybe the purpose of that? so the locally produced food section right now, current law if you look at page 11 it talks about the schools that would be eligible the accountability talks about supervisory unions or supervisory districts this bill proposes to include approved independent schools so rather than repeatedly saying supervisory unions, supervisory district or approved independent school throughout these five pages we're just creating a new definition that includes supervisory unions and supervisory districts yeah um any that's good well, thank you very much yeah, thanks for you folks we're doing it this afternoon oh, yeah oh, so you guys are talking about it, yeah I'm just warming up yeah yeah, good morning good morning so for the record Rosie Krueger I'm the state director of child nutrition programs at the agency of education and so our goal with H-165 has been to make sure that whatever you all decide that you want to do from a policy perspective that it's actually implementable and so we worked pretty closely with that how the agriculture committee to provide a lot of feedback on the original draft of the bill based on what we have learned this year in the pilot year of it to provide some suggested changes places where we needed clarity where we realized this year well, they didn't specify how we should do this so here's our best guess but really going forward if this is going to continue we need direction from the legislature and so the house committee and agriculture accepted and incorporated all of those suggestions so at this point everything's implementable and so it's up to you all to decide is this what you want to do but it is something that we can implement and reflects for the most part what we've been doing this year with a couple changes around independent schools where we asked for clarification so I'm happy to answer questions that you've got I'm certainly happy to talk about the approved pre-pay section because I know that added some confusion and it's not as big a thing as it seems to be but we have for many many years have had a few situations where a school food authority that's operated by a public supervisory union so for example the Mount Abraham unified school district they have also included a childcare program locally that has a pre-K program and under the federal rules a school food authority doesn't have to be just a one LEA it can include multiple local educational agencies and when a childcare operates a state recognized pre-K program that makes them eligible to be a site under a school food authority so under the federal rules these childcare centers that offer a pre-K program could be a site if they can find a public school school food authority that is willing to accept them and include them and that's fairly rare because it is some additional work to have this additional site you're taking on the responsibility of oversight site monitoring making sure they're doing their accounting and claiming correctly but historically we've had a handful of these around the state over the years and during COVID when we had all these waivers from the federal government we had a few more probably 10 or 15 more where because it was so easy to add these locations and the federal government was paying for meals for all children 18 and under more public school school food authorities took on these childcare sites since that since the federal waivers have ended we saw a number of the public school food authorities drop those sites because they just had capacity issues they could have continued this year we would have allowed them and we did allow them to continue this year but they just didn't feel that they had capacity so at this point we're down to just a handful I think maybe serving 500 students in pre-k's and younger so once once a childcare center that has a pre-k is participating in the program they have to provide the meals to all of their students even those kids younger than pre-k so that's why we needed this clarification in here about how do you want us to handle these situations it's a very small number currently theoretically there could be more added in the future but because folks have had that opportunity to do that over the last couple years and even then we haven't seen them at a lot we don't think that there will be a huge increase in the number of public school school food authorities taking on these childcare centers you should know that it's a possibility you're writing the law in a way that would allow it but it relies on the public school school food authority having the capacity to do this so thank you Mr. Chair so Rosie I'm just trying to think of an example that is close to home I know there's a pre-k childcare program in my district that's associated with a church and I'm wondering and I don't know whether they're already under a public school school there are very few so right now when I can think of not a near area but in Burlington the King Street child care center it's a King Street Trinity Child Care Center in Burlington is a private child care center offers a pre-k program that's state approved they're a non-profit which is another critical thing if they're a for-profit they're not allowed under the federal rules to participate so they've got to be non-profit and so Burlington school district has long included them in their school food authority and provided meals to them and claimed reimbursement for those meals from the federal government what you're saying here is that in addition to the reimbursement from the federal government you'll provide the universal meal supplement so you know this happens to be the good shepherd Lutheran church pre-k I don't know all of them off the top of my head but we also have this child and adult care food program which is a federal a federal program for child care centers it's aimed at this population that is available in some cases it's available to non-profit even if they're not under the the reason why somebody might opt to try and operate under the public school school food authority is that CACFP if you're operating it as your own sponsors your own entity requires quite a bit of paperwork and so it is less paperwork for them if they can find a public school to sponsor them but they do have that opportunity to participate in the CACFP and that is a little less restrictive and they don't have to be a non-profit to do that to participate in that program I had another question back on page 5 and maybe it's just the way I'm reading it this is the breakfast section but it specifically calls out breakfast line 10 says providing breakfast meals it can be picked up making breakfast available to students in classrooms the third one so I'm reading that to say most kids don't eat breakfast in the cafeteria so what this section is doing is requiring that the school maximize participation find ways to make the meals available to students as possible one of the ways that has been shown to make the meals more available and students more likely to take advantage of them is to offer grab and go meals where they can take the meal on their way to the classroom or to serve the meals in the classroom we're not saying that everybody has to do that but it's in May what they do have to do is seek to increase participation so depending on their building that may make sense it may not there may be another option that makes more sense for them their schedule how many students they have there's a lot of different ways that you can increase participation so these are a couple of suggestions I don't think it's critical that they're incorporated in here just because again it's a May we're going to suggest those things anyway but I think folks felt like they were good enough ideas to be why have a cafeteria if you're not going to use it that's mostly just for breakfast most schools during COVID we had a lot of meals in the classroom and I think people were pretty happy for lunch but for breakfast students are coming in bus comes in later and we had somebody in that testified we did and when there's stuff left over they can eat another one they have extra food so specifically in here you were not providing the universal meal supplement for that second breakfast only for the first one some of them they was a guy from maybe Burlington some of those kids come to school pretty darn hungry you know a big kid usually it takes more food and so they'll come back for seconds and they just let them under the federal regulations and the breakfast program you're not allowed to prepare for second breakfast or if you have leftovers you're allowed to provide but the state's only been here night before yeah looks like we covered everything yep sir and do you know so it started in house ed you know no the agriculture I'm sorry I've got a longer name now but the house agriculture committee is the one that spent the most time on it okay I'm not sure I know and it went out of there unanimously I'm assuming or not I don't think it was unanimous I think they had a couple of members and then it went to house it it went to house ed and house appropriations house ed I think just a pass through not officially I don't believe they have enough possession of the bill but you will we have it we talked about it earlier and we started the bill I guess two years ago that's right Brian has gone through it yeah and so yeah I ended up in senate ed maybe last year in the end I don't remember and right now I feel like the two committees are working hand in hand hand down with it but what I was thinking when I talked to my committee we're going to take testimony today there's really not much more for us to know I think we're going to probably have a vote next week and then it would go to a protest unless you guys want it for any reason I thought the way we would send you a letter in support of it yeah because we need to move this yeah I don't see any reason to send it back no that's why I thought we would go through it with Rosie and the council and maybe say a few words I mean we've all talked to our own constituents but I haven't had one negative well that's what I was thinking even in our testimony in Senate Ed I haven't heard anything negative and Rosie kind of suggested ain't fixes already that would make it even smoother the I had thought I had a question maybe over on page 8 maybe number 3 yeah that's the one I just asked I think yeah yeah and and then on page 9 I was wondering how many do you have any clue on how many students can the public institutions that are not for profit but wouldn't qualify for the meal are you talking about independent schools or the child care centers on top of page 9 if an approved independent school participates yeah so we have about 15 approved independent schools that participate in the federal child nutrition program generally and I want to say that there's about 4 of them that chose not to offer universal meals this year because of the funding they didn't have enough publicly tuition students to make it feasible for them and mostly they're religious well they're the Catholic schools yeah my cousins went to East Crossford Presbyterian that's what we're talking about right those little schools so there are a lot of little schools that don't participate in the federal child nutrition programs if they are allowed to but you have this bill is structured in a way that only would provide the state funds for the universal meal supplement if they were an approved independent school versus a state recognized so both of those types are allowed to participate in the federal program but you're only providing the universal meal supplement to approved independent schools and you're only providing it to approved independent schools for students attending on public tuition and you're only providing it if the independent school is offering free meals to all of their students and so the the academies, St. John'sbury Academy and Linden Institute they all chose to take the state up on this and offer universal meals to all of their students and draw down those federal funds for the publicly tuition students because they have quite a few publicly tuition students for their non-publicly tuition students they have to come up with another source of funds which generally the students that are privately sent here they're not residents so they need to come up with another source of funds whether that's their endowment or their tuition or something they can't charge those students they can't charge them a meal fee but they need to find some other source of funds and so that's why some of those other schools that I was mentioning the Catholic schools they don't have a lot of publicly tuition students and so when they did the math they decided that they couldn't come up with funding to cover free meals for all of their students so they're still offering a school meals program but they're not offering a universal meals program and so how many children are involved in do you have any clue I could certainly find that out for you but I would need to run a report and do some math so are there any issues left in the bill that would affect how you have to operate the program that would improve it do you think the house got that all yeah they addressed I wrote to the memo about each of the things where we either needed clarification or suggested making a specific change there were a couple areas where we said we don't care what you do but you need to make a decision about do you want us to do this or that and they made a decision in particular this year when we have an independent school operating as a site under a public school food authority so just as I mentioned that can be you do that an independent school can operate as a site under a public school food authority if it's agreeable to both parties which is the kind of it may be or may not be this year we've treated those sites those independent school sites as if they were a public school and provided the universal meal supplement for all of their meals because the public school food authority has taken responsibility for providing those meals we asked for clarification because it wasn't clear at all in last year's bill and the house agriculture committee decided that they wanted to treat those independent schools the same as the independent schools that are operating on their own and so they've specified that here we understand we can move forward and work with that so these are all kind of policy calls for you all and certainly if you wanted to change any of this policy then you could do so but as long as you're comfortable with this policy we can implement this as it's written and now people change the rules on the being able to you don't have to fill out forms now beyond you're taking the Medicare Medicaid and so do we need to work any more on accessing these documents from the parents you don't need to do anything here to start the Medicaid direct cert pilot so I think when I appeared before you earlier this year I mentioned that the Vermont has been approved to participate in USDA's direct certification through Medicaid pilot this will allow us to take data from the Department of Vermont Health Access about students living in households under 130% of the federal poverty level and under 185% of the federal poverty level and directly certify those students for free meals so we don't need applications from the households in order to know that this child qualifies and that allows us to draw down more federal funds when students are directly certified for free meals that also makes the school potentially more likely to be eligible for CEP Community Eligibility Provision which is the more favorable of the two federal universal meals options in terms of drawing down more money and being less paperwork so we're very we're still getting the data together it's going to start July 1st but we're hopeful that this this new Medicaid data is going to allow us to draw down a lot more federal funds and in combination with that USDA has just announced a proposed rule change that would bring down the threshold for participating in the Community Eligibility Provision from 40% of your students being directly certified for free meals to 25% of your students being directly certified for free meals this has the potential to be very good for Vermont in terms of reducing these costs and increasing the number of children who qualify for free meals and so comments are open on that until May 8th the agency of education is planning to submit a comment in support of that rule change you all may be interested in doing that as well you know we have back of the envelope kind of math on this we could potentially see with both the Medicaid direct cert rule change and sorry the Medicaid direct cert pilot and the CEP rule change we could see Vermont's free and reduced rate go from around between 34-38% free and reduced eligible to around 53% just because of the ability to use the federal model hire that's a very we haven't made the matches yet we've got to go through all these steps to figure out exactly how it's going to hit and work out but it has the potential to be very positive thank you Mr. Chair so in line with that Rosie and I want to be clear I will be supporting this I'll be voting yes on that but to do my due diligence can you sort and I know it's a moving target to some degree the ultimate cost of this and what impact that might have on the education portion of property taxes I think JFO has done an estimate and we agree with all the assumptions that they're making in that estimate so I would encourage you to go look at that for next school year the only impact we're going to see is the direct cert through Medicaid pilot the USDA rule change won't have gone into effect so for next year they're estimating 29 million but I believe that their estimate going forward from that the low end of that estimate has gotten lower than it was before because of the potential for this USDA rule change of course that rule change you know it's still in the proposed status it might not get finalized there's no guarantee so if that doesn't go through then the high end is still the same high end estimate but if we if we go to 53% instead of 28 or no 34 to 38 we're going to gain 12-15% more federal money I mean we're talking it's a lot better than we thought it would be serious money because the overall cost of that of the total hot lunch program it's got to be very high the overall say if we had federal support oh if we were trying to operate the same program without federal support yes the federal support is significant and critically important for that yeah for sure so and do you know if there's been any talk about the beds going across the board or the universal school meals program across the country so I mean the Biden administration has signaled that they would clearly like to do that they included with their hunger summit that they did last fall one of their goals was to increase universal meals to offer it at more schools this rule change is something that they can do without congress acting and so they're taking that step most of the other things that they're looking at that they would like to do to make universal meals more available such as increasing the multiplier for CEP to have a proposal to congress to increase that multiplier from 1.6 to 2.5 that would be huge but it's got to go through congress so the likelihood of that happening in this congress I mean it doesn't seem like a lot of changes are likely I know the current administration would like to support it and see more happen and they're encouraging states and actually having a lot of other states talk to Vermont about what we've done so far and what we've learned but they can only do so much without congress acting so you are getting a big inquiries on yeah we've been able to share with other folks and there were I think we discussed these when I shared the implementation report with you earlier this year but there were some surprises that we didn't in terms of lines being longer in those provision two base year schools potentially impacting participation so some things that we weren't necessarily prepared for that we've been able to share with other folks as well so I know you've probably told us just before and I apologize for making you do it again how many other states are doing what we're doing right now so there are some states that have made a permanent and some states that are in a pilot status so the first two states to make it permanent were California and Maine and they made it permanent this past at the time that we were doing a pilot they went ahead and made the program permanent so they're already doing it Colorado made it permanent through referendum so they are starting that program now Minnesota I believe just passed it and New Mexico just passed it permanently and then Massachusetts similar to Vermont did a one year program to see how it would go and so they're also right now considering whether they want to extend it and Connecticut took a little bit of a halfway measure they didn't provide enough funding for the full year and so they I'm very glad that we were not in that position they ended up partway through the year running out of funding and their schools having to switch back to charging and then they kind of state was that Connecticut and then they some additional funding at this point and so they're trying to figure out what they're doing going forward whether they're going to make it permanent or not and I think that Rhode Island is considering it I'm not sure if they've it only they've made it permanent but the actually done it but it's under consideration there and how did they set there's another question were their program set up similar to ours no our program was a little bit unique in that we required the schools to maximize the federal funds in order to draw down the state funding and there some of the other states have struggled to get their schools to participate in CEP in order to draw down the most federal funds so that's an area where we've been sharing with other folks that this is really the way to do it if you're going to do it so I had said we haven't had that part of it I mean be kind of crazy if we didn't maximize the money that was already coming yeah hopefully I mean we talked about this earlier this year about having a more attractive letter parents are getting the importance of getting this but now with this federal change that isn't not quite so necessary yeah well so it's a little bit interesting so the Medicaid because we have such high uptake of Medicaid in Vermont we think that's going to capture most of the students who would have previously qualified by submitting an application so we're much less worried about this when we first started talking about universal meals we were really worried about losing all those students and losing them as you know losing that metric of student poverty and the preliminary data from Diva is looking good to show that those we're going to capture most of those students again we haven't done the actual matches of individual students yet other states when they've rolled out the Medicaid direct cert pilot have not seen as high a matri so it might not go as well as we're hoping we don't know if that's because you know the Medicaid uptake isn't as high in other states what might be going on there so we'll see how it goes the other piece the students that aren't captured would be any students who aren't participating in Medicaid and so the particular group that we're worried about would be students who aren't citizens who you know or may have a different citizenship status and we want to make sure that we're capturing those students as well so there is a group at the agency not this bill last year but another bill that you passed last year instructed the agency to work on household income forms and using that as a metric of student poverty and so there's another group at the agency that's working on that they're incorporating the understanding that we'll have this Medicaid data going forward but making sure that we capture all the other students who might be missed by that I'm wondering if other states or if Vermont has considered a way for families who can pay for meals to donate to a fund or do they just send a check to their local school or is there nothing for more or is there anything informal for people who say hey I can afford it I want to send a check the schools all run a nonprofit school food service account and so at any point anybody could make a donation to that account and you've seen certainly over a number of years that people have donated to those accounts specifically to pay the unpaid meal charges of other students and so that still exists and folks are certainly welcome to do that we haven't made any formal recommendation or push or anything on that but that's an option Do any of the other universal meals programs cut it off at certain levels of income from parents or they... No the ones that have been implemented in other states are so Connecticut and Mass their income average family income compared to ours and they didn't worry about paying for their little rich who weren't accused of all the time I mean we could probably put most of them all in one state but they I think I think we did a good job from the advice from new folks and under three Vermont and the other organizations we put a pretty good build together it's working well have you had any complaints from families or school districts that we haven't been able to address? No complaints from families, the folks who are most the only complaints I've particularly heard are from those independent schools, the Catholic schools particularly that feel frustrated that they're not included and that their students are included But we're fixing that No, you've continued to exclude them in this film so that's a policy decision for you where do you want to put your public funds, do you want to send and that's your... They are a private school dealing with they aren't taking public schools So these are all approved independent schools so they could take public school students because they're approved and they could receive tuition if those students are eligible for tuition so they may have some of those students who are tuition there but they're not making up a big enough share of their student body to make it worth their while to offer universal meals Any other questions? Thank you Mr. Chair I would just like to vote for just to whether you could come up with a language or someone else does submit a letter to the USDA about that proposed rule change before the May deadline I don't know if we would normally do that but I would like to support that rule change However, you mentioned that our committee could submit a letter and it's open for public comment so you could individually do it or you could do it as a committee I think you could maybe have more weight I mean there you go I could do a resolution for the whole senate but that deadline has come out fast maybe you have to submit it through the public comment portal so if you do a resolution make sure that you then get it into the or even just to our delegation whatever right because we need funding for school construction we wrote to the delegation no money has come yet for you you want to pull with that sure, well I'll take suggestions I'll talk to you I'll send you the regional panel wheel here thank you that's a good idea any other questions for Rosie? no thank you Rosie you've done a great job keeping a lid on this thing making it work when we all started we didn't know where it would end up or how it would go but it's gone very well in order to do you want to say anything? would you like me to say something Mr. Chair? be kind of nice you've been working for a kid getting that thing not quite not quite well it's been a while yeah we want, were you here when we said we want all kids to have get a star cookie oh yes yes, absolutely I'm going to make them this week just wait, how many, 82,000 84? 84,000 well I'll make them for the committee first get a test you're going to eat the first good morning good morning for the record I'm the executive director of Humphrey, Vermont I mean I don't have anything prepared for you all I would like to start by saying that you know Senator Starr, you are accurate this bill that became Act 151 and now this new bill, H165 really is an excellently designed bill and a lot of credit goes to our agency of education for not only working on the initial design and consulting but then coming back in this session to work on those clarifications to really make sure that this bill is being implemented so smoothly and so well well I mean not this bill but Act 151 the pilot is being implemented so smoothly and so well and it's making a really profound, profound difference for families and teachers and schools you have either found already or you will find soon in your mail folders out there a handout of quotes from teachers from all over the state about the difference that that universal school meals is making for their students and their ability to teach during what is I think we've all heard on the news if not in the education committees an incredibly challenging time in public education mental health challenges for students the challenges of being out of person and back in person and all of that that's going on and what we've heard a lot that we didn't necessarily predict that we would hear is the word relief that it has been a relief for families and for kids to know that they can come in to school that they will be fed that they will all be fed the same that they have that opportunity to go to the cafeteria in the morning before school or grab a breakfast and just settle in and settle down and that I think tells us something about how broken the old system of providing school meals was through its flawed federal design because we've heard a lot of stories from students who whose families could afford to provide meals to pay for school meals and either who you know didn't always remember to put that funding on their accounts so they would show up at the line and they would hear it be told that they didn't have the money in their account and those kinds of things but even more their own feeling of stigma and discomfort because they would get it were getting a meal but they knew that their friend afford to pay for their meal didn't qualify for free reduced price school meals and spent every lunch in the library hungry and not eating so that stigma is real it keeps kids from every income level from accessing this critical support for their education every day in 2019 the last year for which we have pre-pandemic data we know that there were about 35,000 students in Vermont who were eligible for free or reduced price school meals based on their family income and yet every day in schools about 32% of them were not eating because they were embarrassed to take the meal or been enrolled in the meal program in the first place by their families so I just am painting a little bit of a picture for you all and to say that now before you is a bill that makes it possible for us to never ever ever have to have this conversation again I don't ever want to sit in this chair in this committee or any other committee in this state house ever again and talk to you about kids in school and we can end that right now you can end that right now so that is very exciting and those changes in the federal rule that Rosie just spoke of mean something else really really exciting and we've just been working on the calculations on this but it means that it means that because of this rule change that according to USDA they intend to have go through Rosie's right the comment period doesn't close until May 8 so yes absolutely get your public comment in but if that goes through because of the way these programs work together 79 additional towns in Vermont serving over 6500 kids are going to also be made eligible to offer universal free after school and summer meal programs to all children ages 0 to 18 fully funded by federal dollars and that will but only if they're using the community eligibility provision to provide universal meals during the school year and they'll only be able to afford to do that if they get the universal meal supplement offered in H165 so I actually have some I have some data about that that I have prepared from our calculations that I would be happy to share with each of you for your individual counties what this would mean for towns in your individual counties I know well this is the latest because of this rule change that was only announced maybe a week, a week and a half ago by USDA so I'll hand those to your clerk well how many complaints did you get about the program from the families experiencing it and schools experiencing it 0 I was amazed at how meaning you know talk about the roads and the mud and bad snow and but three or four people stood up and under out the business and talked about how great the school meals program was and they appreciated that all the children could go through and yeah I mean it was pretty pretty supportive and not one negative report from principals, superintendents they're all very happy when they don't know down south as I said to share yesterday we had a dinner with local principals Tuesday night at Tuesday night and it was the one thing two things people said please please please continue this it's making a huge difference so any other questions thank you well thank you and thank you again thank you for your time you might be putting you out of a job so there's plenty of other complications to tackle but I'd be happy to be tackling that I don't know it would be great to put you out of a job but I know I think there's a lot more work left to be done to be there for sure so we'll take a little break here