no soup for you

Punishment on the cheesy side
No more pizza or burgers for children of deadbeat parents
By Richard Marosi - LOS ANGELES TIMES
Updated: 06/24/07 6:47 AM

CHULA VISTA, Calif. — When too many parents fell behind on paying for school lunches, the Chula Vista Elementary School District decided to get tough — on the children.

They told pupils with deadbeat parents that they had only one lunch choice: a cheese sandwich.

The sandwich, served on whole wheat bread, came with a clear message: Tell your parents to pay up, or no more pizza and burgers for you.

Cheese sandwiches and other “alternate meals” have been added to menus in school districts across the country as they try to take a bite out of parents’ lunch debts.

The strategy worked in Chula Vista: Lunch debts in the district fell from about $300,000 in 2004 to $67,000 in 2006. Some angry parents say success came at too high a cost, however.

The cheese sandwich, they say, has become a badge of shame for the children, who get teased about it by their classmates. One student cried when her macaroni and cheese was replaced with a sandwich. A little girl hid in a restroom to avoid getting one. Many of the sandwiches end up untouched or tossed whole in the garbage. Sometimes kids pound them to pieces.

“I think it’s an infamous cheese sandwich,” said Frank Luna, whose son, Christopher, just finished the sixth grade.

A year ago, he said, a cafeteria worker took away Christopher’s pizza and forced him in front of his friends to pick up a sandwich instead. A similar incident occurred when Christopher was in the third grade.

“The kid was humiliated,” said his father, who added that he did not realize he owed less than $10.

In Chula Vista, the largest elementary school district in the state, administrators said they had to control the ballooning debt before it forced them to make cuts in such areas as classroom equipment and books.

“When we did nothing, there was no incentive to pay,” said Dennis Doyle, assistant superintendent of the district, which serves about 18,000 meals daily, including about 400 alternate meals.

Most schools across the country have introduced alternate meals, said Erik Peterson, a spokesman for the School Nutrition Association, an Alexandria, Va.-based organization for school nutrition professionals.

Orange County’s Capistrano Unified School District serves crackers with peanut butter or cheese. The Los Angeles Unified School District gives children half a sandwich and a piece of fruit. Peanut butter-and-jelly sandwiches are a common alternate meal, but not a very effective one.

“It seemed to be one of the children’s very favorite meals, so that wasn’t productive,” said Beth Taylor, nutrition director for the Johnston County School District in North Carolina, where such sandwiches were tried.

Taylor said switching to vegetable and fruit trays changed everything. Among last week’s menu items for students with lunch balances: crunchy cole slaw, fried squash and steamed cabbage. “The outstanding debt has been reduced to nothing,” she said.