Fast Food on Campus is Popular, but Critics Say It’s Against the Law

With only 32 minutes to eat, Giovanni Barillas and his buddies on the Lakewood High School football team wolfed down McDonald’s Quarter Pounders for lunch recently. But they did not have to hop in a car and leave campus.

At Lakewood and Millikan high schools, McDonald’s delivers--and so do several other fast-food franchises.

The two high schools contracted with fast-food outlets to take turns delivering food to the campuses, where student workers sell the items from their own student stores. The fast-food, school officials said, helps ease the lunchtime crunch in the school cafeteria and provides an inducement for students to stay on campus.

Students said they love having Domino’s pizza and other popular foods delivered. “It’s awesome that they bring in this food,” said student Thanisha Totemwongse.

But the deliveries probably will be stopped soon because they violate a Long Beach Unified School District policy, according to Edward M. Eveland, assistant superintendent for secondary schools. The district limits the number of outside food sales on campus to four days in the school year, he said.

Board Member Speaks Out

Some school board members and cafeteria workers also expressed concern over the fast-food arrangements.

School board member Harriet Williams said: “It’s not only bad for the kids, it’s against the law.” School Board President Jenny Oropeza agreed. “I don’t think we should be doing this,” she said. “Fast food is not nutritional. . . . It’s not good for the kids.”

On Tuesday, Eveland plans to meet with the principals to discuss a compromise that, he said, will probably increase the limit on outside food sales from four days to eight or 10 days. To some students and school officials, Eveland’s solution is hardly a compromise.

“Everybody is going to starve now,” complained Lakewood High student John Sadler, who said students leave campus for lunch because the cafeteria lines are long and the food is not worth waiting for. Many others skip lunch altogether, students and school officials said, because the lunch period is so short or because their parents have not requested a lunch pass that would allow their children to leave campus.

“It’s pretty bummy,” junior Lydia Rolon said when told the new service is expected to stop.

Lakewood High student activities director James Wickman agreed with the students. “Without these sales, they will hop in their cars and go to McDonald’s. I would feel better if they stay on campus,” he said

Wickman said more than 1,000 of the school’s 3,400 students buy from the fast-food menu every day.

Officials at Lakewood and Millikan said they resorted to the fast-food sales this year for several reasons:

* Each high school has about 900 more students this year because of the transfer of all ninth graders from junior to senior high schools.

* The cafeterias have small seating capacities. The cafeteria at Millikan can accommodate 475 students. The cafeteria capacity at Lakewood is 330.

* Students are more likely to remain on campus, which cuts down on tardiness and safety problems.

* Student litter in surrounding neighborhoods is reduced.

* Only one lunch period is required.

The fast-food merchants prepare their subs, pizzas and burgers in their own kitchens and deliver them to the school stores. The school buys the food at wholesale prices and sells them at the restaurant’s regular price, allowing a profit of about 20% for the Student Body Assn., which funds student activities, according to Wickman and Millikan High activities director Bob Schnebeck.

Alice Baer, president of the Lakewood High PTA, said she supports the fast-food sales because they encourage students to remain on campus, reducing safety concerns.

“I think right now the parents are not complaining, but it’ll be interesting to see what happens if they stop,” Baer said. “A lot of parents feel that if the fast food was not available, a lot of the kids would not eat.”

Traditionally, district administrators have not enforced the four-day limit on such sales. Last year, for example, pizza was delivered every Friday to the Lakewood High campus.

But this year, cafeteria workers complained after Millikan and Lakewood arranged for daily fast-food deliveries.

Eveland and school officials said that the workers are worried that reduced lunch sales will result in fewer work hours and could eventually even lead to layoffs. “They see that as illegal competition with the service they are providing and that service means salaries (to them,)” Eveland said.

But Glenda Curtice, president of the Queen Mary chapter of the California School Food Service Assn., said the cafeteria workers’ only concern is that the food be handled properly. Some workers have said, for example, that food occasionally sits without proper heating for more than an hour before being served, according to Curtice.

Others also said that school cafeterias already serve such teen-age favorites as pizza and hamburgers, but with other selections that meet the federal requirements of a balanced meal.

“I’m not down on pizza,” said Fae Husen, the district’s acting director of food service. “(But) I think they need some additional things too, like vegetables and fruits. And I like to see them have a glass of milk--because these children are growing.”