School Lunch Politics by Susan Levine Page B

number of black households getting food stamps rose 11%, to 2.4 million, while recipients among white households rose by 12%, to 4.2 million. The number of Hispanic households was 700,000, or an increase of 17%. Overall, 6.8 million households got stamps, or about 8% of all households.
    7. Constance Newman and Katherine Ralston, “Profiles of Participants in the National School Lunch Program: Data from Two National Surveys,” United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service, Economic Information Bulletin No. 17, August 2006 (Electronic Report), iii, 5, 9.
    8. Saba Sultana Brelvi, “Current Policy Trends in the National School Lunch Program,” Honors Thesis, Health and Society Department, Brown University, May 1, 1995 p. 15. Thanks to Ellen Messer for this reference. Also see Steven M. Lutz and Jay Hirschman, “School Lunch Reform: Minimal Market Impacts from Providing Healthier Meals,” Food Review, January-April, 1998, p. 31.
    9. Matsumoto, “The National School Lunch Program.”
    10. Ibid.
    11. BarryYeoman, “Unhappy Meals,” Mother Jones (January/February 2003) http://www.motherjones.com . The proposed 2007 farm bill for the first time guaranteed USDA purchase not only of “surplus” commodities but of “specialty crops” as well. These new crops included fruits and vegetables that would satisfy “new concerns about nutrition in the federally funded school meals program.” “To Subsidize Actual Food,” Chicago Tribune, March 16, 2007.
    12. http://www.asfsa.org/who/history.html . Also see Ron Haskins, “The School Lunch Lobby,” Education Next, The Hoover Institution, http://www.educationnext.org .
    13. The federal school lunch financing system remained arcane and complex. Schools received federal cash reimbursements at different levels for free, reducedprice, and full-price meals. In addition, schools could purchase USDA surplus commodities called “entitlement foods.” These were distributed according to the number of meals served.
    14. See, e.g., example, http://www.oseda.missouri.edu/kidcnt/pctfrln.html . This Web site of the Missouri education department stipulated that the percentage of students enrolled for free or reduced-price lunch is a measure to be used “to approximate the percent of children living in poverty, a census measure that is only available every ten years. Students whose families have incomes below 130% of the poverty line are eligible for free lunches through the National School Lunch Program.” In 1994 over one-third of Missouri students were enrolled in the school lunch program.
    15. “Schools Find New Route to Diversity,” Chicago Tribune, January 28, 2002.
    16. Melissa Alexander, “Tortillas Become Staple Fare in Nation’s Public schools,” Milling and Baking News, June 24, 1997, http://www.bakingbusiness.com .
    17. Charlene Price and Betsy Kuhn, “Public and Private Efforts for the National School Lunch Program,” Children’s Diets (May-August 1996): 54.
    18. Http://www.asfsa.org/who/history.htm .
    19. Sharon Palmer, “Making the Grade with School-Lunch Programs,” Food Product Design: Foodservice Annual, November 2002.
    20. Price and Kuhn, “Public and Private Efforts,” 55.
    21. “Is Your Kid Failing Lunch?” Consumer Reports, September 1998, p. 50.
    22. Ibid., 52. The report found that fast-food brands were offered in 13% of the nation’s schools.
    23. A few schools had already contracted with McDonald’s during the 1970s, but it was not until the 1990s that fast-food franchises became commonplace in school cafeterias.
    24. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “Fact Sheet: Food Service,” CDC School Health Policies and Programs Study, 2000; and Alexander, “Tortillas Become Staple Fare.”
    25. Price and Kuhn, “Public and Private Efforts,” 56.
    26. Melissa Alexander, “Pizza in the