ANAHEIM : U.S. Official Critical of School Lunch Plan

The U.S. secretary of agriculture on Monday called a House Republican proposal to transfer responsibility for school lunch programs to states a “wrong-headed measure” and “a very stupid idea.”

“Block granting these programs will mean the end of a national commitment to school lunch and school nutrition programs,” Dan Glickman told more than 1,000 school food service directors who have gathered in Anaheim for a national conference.

“It will not necessarily happen overnight. Some states will continue to use the money for feeding better than others,” Glickman said. “But after a few years many kids will miss out on their only nutritional meal of the day, and this Administration will not let that happen.”

While House and Senate Republicans are debating how to reduce spending on nutrition and other welfare programs, the Department of Agriculture is making sweeping changes to bring school lunch programs into compliance with federal nutrition standards.

Conference participants say they are caught in a bind between the higher costs of meeting those standards and threats of reductions in their budgets.

“We are in a lose-lose situation,” said Vivian Pilant, president of the American School Food Service Assn., which sponsored the conference. “We are in total support of the dietary guidelines,” Pilant said, “but many school directors think they can’t implement them without added cost.”

The USDA guidelines require schools to prepare meals containing no more than 30% fat, by increasing the amount of fruits and vegetables they serve or by using menus based on nutritional value rather food type.

A Department of Agriculture report released last fall showed that meals served at 99% of participating schools violated then-proposed nutrition guidelines, with an average of 38% of calories from fat. It also showed that average sodium content was almost twice the recommended level.