Guy Gordon (00:00.558)
Hello and welcome again to another Facts Matters podcast. I’m Guy Gordon on behalf of the Citizens Research Council of Michigan dedicated to the proposition that facts should drive policy, not politics. And as we look at the beginning of the Michigan school year, politics abounds certainly. We’ve got parents either rejoicing or shedding a tear with the end of summer, but the one thing they all have in common is the most…

highly used form of punctuation right now is the question mark, especially on the part of teachers and administrators. I’m joined by Craig Thiel, Research Director for the Citizens Research Council, who first warned us about this back in June, about the impact of the budget uncertainty on the Michigan Free Breakfast, Free Meals for All program. Craig, welcome.

Hey, thanks, guys. Thanks for having me to the podcast.

And I guess the facts that really matter here is somewhat of a breaking news, which is this lack of certainty in the K-12 budget is already prompting some school districts, at least one notable school district, to make a decision about their meals program even before the kids return.

Yes, Guy. We just wrapped up last school year. was the second full school year where the state of Michigan guaranteed to all school districts across the state that students would eat free breakfast and free lunch, regardless of their income status. And the state funded that program for the last two years to the tune of about $200 million.

Craig Thiel (01:42.152)
As you’ve heard, the state budget hasn’t been completed. And one of the items that is not in the mix, at least in terms of the House budget proposal, is dedicated funding for the universal school meals program. So that $200 million that has been in the budget for the last two years is not there, designated for school meals. And it’s caused a

a school district here in mid Michigan to tell parents that until the state decides what it’s gonna do, we’re gonna err on the side of caution and not offer free meals to all students. But keeping in mind that the students that do qualify based on their income for free breakfast and lunch through the federal school lunch program will continue to be fed in schools.

So that $200 million, which was the state basically backfilling what the feds had provided during COVID, when they said food insecurity was so rampant that they felt that they had to go and supply these meals regardless of income, that there wasn’t going to be means tested anymore. So that $200 million is still in the House GOP budget. It just isn’t earmarked. So why is that a concern?

Well, for school districts that, for the last two years, have received that money specifically for school meals, they would not get that money specifically for school meals. But as you noted, the money’s still in the budget. But instead of being earmarked, it’s rolled up with a number of other items. And those dollars then are given to school districts and

they’re given the flexibility, the discretion then to decide how they want to program those dollars. So the House proposal provides the same top line level of funding to school districts, but how that money flows to districts looks different in the House proposal compared to what the governor and the Senate proposed.

Guy Gordon (03:52.558)
It also opens the door that in a pantheon of competing priorities that many of these superintendents might say, well, okay, look, I’ve got this money that has free meals for all in it, but it also is to go to English learners, mental health, school safety, literacy coaches, assessments. I mean, a lot of important stuff. Maybe we can shave some dollars off the meals program and put it into higher priorities, which means not everybody’s going to be covered.

That’s kind of the motive of the House proposal is to move the funding decisions, program specific funding decisions from Lansing down to the local districts, giving districts the ability to decide what’s best for their students. Now with that comes the loss of a guaranteed funding stream. In this case, the free meals or

student mental health grants. what districts then have is the ability to say, well, we think mental health is the most important program. So we’re going to put our school meals dollars into mental health or vice versa.

What would be wrong with that if you believe in local control and making sure that the money follows the greatest need for that particular district? What are the consequences of that other than maybe getting a budget that’s tailored for that district and would be more effective?

Exactly. district administrators, superintendents are provided extra flexibility with the way the house plan is laid out. But proponents and advocates for feeding students or statewide organizations that want to make sure that the mental health needs of students are attended to, the loss of dedicated funding

comes with a loss of statewide accountability for the use of those dollars. So now, instead of advocates going to Lansing saying we want students to be fed, students social emotional learning needs to be addressed in the state capital, they have to make those cases to every school district across the state.

Well, there also though is a very, I think, a human consequence to this as well, at least according to the proponents of the Meals for All. And that is right now, if everything’s means tested, Tom gets a free meal, Jack doesn’t. Jack now knows that Tom is a low income kid, and that means Tom can be the target of bullying, or at least there is a stigma that you’re one of the poor kids that gets a free lunch. When you have Free Meals for All,

Guy Gordon (07:35.278)
There was no stigma attached. I guess at a human level, how significant is that?

Yeah, no, the research has shown that feeding students, well-fed students, are developmentally better off, academically better off, socially better off, including reducing stigma. That’s for sure the case. However, the program at the federal level guarantees that anyone who qualifies for free lunches

will get fed. The state program was

Well, hold on a second there because I believe that you’re right. But they have to qualify first and with recent changes to SNAP and Medicaid, that can influence eligibility, can’t it?

Right, so we’re in a period right now where the federal government is making fairly substantial changes to social safety net programs. while we don’t know the specific numbers of impact, either nationally or in Michigan, we do know the general direction. And that is people will be losing access to Medicaid and access to SNAP. And those programs are used in Michigan schools to help identify students for

Craig Thiel (08:57.998)
free meals. If they automatically qualify for Medicaid or SNAP, then they automatically get recognized as being eligible for free and reduced price lunch. If families lose those federal program benefits, then they will have to go and apply through a paper form with their school district to document that they’re income eligible for the

free school meals. So even though you’re correct, we have a lot of uncertainty with Medicaid and SNAP enrollments down the line. Families, if they qualify based on their income, will still be able to access the federal free meals program.

may require more engagement on the part of the school district and maybe social workers within the system to make sure that families follow those do file the correct paperwork and make sure that their kids are found to be eligible.

Right, right, and Michigan’s been at the forefront of linking up those federal safety net programs and the school lunch programs such that it’s almost automatic. a student or parents are on the Medicaid rolls or the SNAP rolls, then the schools get that information and just automatically roll those students into the free school meals program. But with the federal changes that you’ve discussed

you know, if a parent temporarily loses Medicaid, eligibility because they didn’t fill out a, piece of paper or they, they didn’t, show up for, a meeting, with the department of human services or whatever. Those impacts would have downstream effects on their children that are, are in enrolled in school and getting free meals through Medicaid and snap eligibility.

Guy Gordon (11:04.888)
So right now, because the budget process is still at this stalemate and we really don’t know where we’re going to end up, can we make an educated and informed guess at where the chips may fall? You said for kids that qualified in the past, maybe pre-pandemic, you believe that those kids will still qualify, but what about those kids kind of in the middle?

Right, right. Well, the federal school meals program is income-based. The State Department of Ed sent out the income thresholds just two weeks ago, notifying schools and parents what those are. Again, if families qualify based on those thresholds, if they’re not getting access directly through the federal programs,

the state has a application process that families got in their kind of return to school packets that they need to fill out. And this would be kind of an important piece of paper to pay attention, especially given the uncertainty around the Michigan funding for parents to fill that out just as a safeguard in the event that, you know, the Medicaid changes at the stamp.

changes capture those families kind of in the changes that are happening at the federal level.

And you’ve pointed out that this may complicate some things if districts like Okemos decide just to abandon the Meals for All program altogether. There will certainly be an impact with the kids on the fringes that were getting it before. But there were already some funding inequities when it came to how the state doled out those $200 that

Guy Gordon (12:54.158)
the the the we’ve got these districts that are haves these districts that are have nots and in some cases they have nots even though they had a higher burden of free meals they didn’t get indexed funding.

Right, right. Because of the nature of the universal meals for all.

The majority of the $200 million that the state was putting in to kind of cover the difference between what it costs to feed all kids and what the federal government brings to the table. On a per pupil basis, more funding was going to districts that might be considered more well off. In other words, districts that have lower concentrations of low income students because the money is being used to fund lunches and breakfasts

for families that have incomes that are above the federal free lunch level of thresholds. So yes, the funding for the school meals program is kind of skewed more in terms of a per pupil distribution towards higher income districts, districts with fewer low income students. Again, because the idea is we are the state

through this field meals program is providing funding for all students after the federal government picks up its portion of the tab for low income students.

Guy Gordon (14:27.468)
So do we know approximately how many students this could potentially?

impact. We know that I prior to the Meals for All program back in 2019, prior to the pandemic, we had 383,000 students getting some form of low income meal support. When we went to Meals for All, how much did that increase? And so correspondingly, how many might we lose?

Yeah, it’s the State Department of Ed provided a snapshot based on, think, some October student counts. Yeah, one month picture, which is probably fine for painting a kind of an overall view of this. It’s north of 100,000 students on about a 1.4 million student enrollment statewide.

Yeah, one month picture.

Craig Thiel (15:30.702)
Maybe about 10 to 15 % of K-12 students would lose access to these free meals. Now, the free meals for all, as the title implies, is available to all students. But not all students participate for one reason or the other. But when we look at the data provided by the Department of Ed, there was between 150,000, 200,000

200,000 student bump up from the participation rate before the free school meals for all program was implemented to when it was implemented.

Okay, so is there anything that we haven’t touched on yet that you think that we need to give a quick look to? If not, let’s do a quick wrap up.

Guy Gordon (16:26.702)
So first and foremost, we’ve got districts already making the call on whether to kill the free meals for all just because of the uncertainty.

Right, and I was going to make a point that the current year budget runs through September 30th. And so that $200 million that’s available this year is good through the end of September. So schools that started last week and that start after Labor Day will still have the money from this current fiscal year.

Why spend it if you know what are you going to buy food? Are you going to hire people not knowing whether or not it’s going to be all canceled in 30 days?

So it’s definitely a challenge. Some districts have been super conservative and said, you know what, until we know that the state dollars are going to be there, we’re not going to offer it up. so beginning with, you know, the first day of school, the case that you mentioned, Okumis has told the parents don’t plan on free meals for all. Definitely students who qualify for free

reduced price lunch through the federal program will continue to get those benefits. But the students that don’t qualify through that, those mechanisms won’t have access to the free meals program that’s funded by the state.

Guy Gordon (17:53.666)
Okay, and I think the other key takeaway based on our conversation is that regardless of what happens with the state budget, maybe they will fund the entire program again and earmark that $200 million if that is what comes out of negotiations on the part of administrators and on the part of parents, you still may have a higher bar to get your student to qualify.

Yeah, yeah. that would be being driven largely by the federal changes with the federal Medicaid and SNAP. the immediate concern, I think, for families in Michigan is whether or not the state’s going to re-up and reauthorize the $200 million. The midterm and long term

challenges to families are what’s happening at the federal level and how those changes will affect, you know, families’ ability to access Medicaid and SNAP.

And in the meantime, as we said, the question marks loom and maybe one of the biggest question marks in the kitchen these days is what are we packing for the kids lunch? Because they, in some cases, they may not have had to do that for a while.

Yep, it’s been two years that the states operated this program and I imagine a lot of families, especially if they just started the K-12 journey, that’s the only thing they’ve known in the time that their kids have been enrolled in public schools.

Guy Gordon (19:23.726)
Craig Thiel, thanks so much, Research Director at the Citizens Research Council of Michigan.

Have a great day.

And as lawmakers continue to hash out the state budget, we’ll be here to make sense of it for you. If you enjoy these fact-based, unbiased, partisan-free looks at state policy and policy that impacts families like yours, we want to remind you that this is completely donor-funded at the Citizens Research Council of Michigan. We don’t take government dollars. We don’t take lobbying dollars. We are donor-supported. And if this is…

a valuable service to you, then we invite you to visit crcmish.org. That’s crcmish.org and maybe throw a few coins in the kettle. Until then, for the Facts Matter podcast, I’m Guy Gordon. Have a great day.
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