Posted on 01/14/2011 10:39:49 AM PST by NormsRevenge
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The government is officially announcing on Friday an expanded program that should provide 140,000 to 150,000 children from low income families with supper meals, a senior Agriculture Department official said.
A federal program aiding such children, many with parents away from home until late in the evening, has been in operation in 13 states and the District of Columbia, but USDA Under Secretary Kevin Concannon told Reuters in an interview that "this afternoon the official announcement goes out that the program will be available in all 50 states."
The expansion, authorized in the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 signed into law in December, "is likely to enroll about between 140,000 and 150,000 children nationally," said Concannon, who has responsibility for federal food and nutrition programs.
He said organizations such as schools, boys and girls clubs and community groups had been waiting for the announcement so they could take advantage of the program. It will enable them to be paid by the federal government for providing the suppers if they meet the standards for eligibility and the meals meet health and nutrition requirements.
The program will be "available in areas where the local schools have at least half of the children attending the school receiving free or reduced-price lunches as part of the national school lunch program," Concannon said.
"The principle goal in this case is to make sure that kids are getting adequately fed and getting nutritious food," he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
I know a woman who gets $900 a month in food stamps AND free food from a food pantry monthly AND the kids get fed at school for “free” AND they get “free” school packages each year-backpacks, notebooks etc....they also get “gift cards” for school clothes and shoes and coats...
Her husband works and her and her three kids are on Medicaid-the kids are teens, so now they’re getting into glasses and braces etc.
The kids are just a meal ticket; she has had a few jobs over the last ten years, but not enough to count. She plays the system so well, it is astounding to me.
SZQ
I believe “Dinner” was originally the name for the largest meal of the day, in the days of the family farm that was normally the midday meal. “Supper” was a light meal at the end of the day. In those days people ate sensibly, that is to say, a large breakfast to fuel up for the day’s work, a large midday meal, “Dinner” to keep you going for the rest of the day and a small meal in the evening so you could sleep well and wake up ready to go again. Now most people eat all wrong, little or no breakfast, a fast food lunch and a huge meal in the evening. It really is backward from common sense eating.
It has got to stop. More than likely, they are also on the earned income tax credit too.
I pay for half my medical and my wife works, pays for part of hers and pays for her married daughters health and car insurance and helps out with her expenses. We are not having a tough time getting by yet we have to watch the frills. Our cars are 12 and 10 years of age yet we make a decent income. I look around and see all these benefits being lavished upon “the poor” and I believe that when evaluated, their total compensation package is higher than ours. I want to puke because I am tired of pulling the wagon.
My husband and I are poor, and strive to just pay for stuff we have to have like utilities and insurance. My husband has no health insurance and is not eligible for anything; plus he’s unemployed now and I’m disabled. We don’t eat out, go to movies, take vacations or have a new car. We make due with what God provides as He has ALWAYS taken care of us somehow...
But you’re right; it has to stop...even her kids know it isn’t right and I’ve explained to them that they aren’t getting ‘free stuff’...they are slowly learning what taxes are and who really pays for their “free lunch”.
The kids ALL have cell phones and MP3 players and one has his own laptop and IPod; all their furniture and their brand new 42”HDTV are from Rent-A-Center...nice, huh?
SZQ
They’ll get free supper but still end up losing their education and their futures to the big teacher’s unions and other corrupt left wing organizations.
The old cotton plantations gave out free food too....
Same situation here, although thank god both hubby and I are employed. He has no health insurance. Neither do I. He pays half his net income in child support to his ex-shrew who is a CPS worker and gets cadillac benefits, her new husband makes twice what I do easily. They are constantly going on elaborate vacations, eating out, you name it. Hubby has NO SAY over anything parental; she stripped that away the moment they divorced. Just pay the child support and look the other way. Oh and the kids have all the gadgets as well. Of course every one of them is failing in school.
“Did I really need the /sarc tag?”
Well you shouldn’t
but there are whacko trolls on here who would think that even after WIC and SNAP and 2 meals plus after school snacks at schools children are starving.
If any child is starving, which based on obesity rates and a quick look at any school, it is the fault of the parent.
I was hoping it was sarcasm.
That, and what did these so-called needy parents do with the money they were already given to feed their children? This is simply another redistribution of wealth scheme.
It also is meant to remand children to the education system so it has more time to propagandize them and make them less dependent on Mommy and/or Daddy.
Where did the government get the right to feed anyone??
How convenient for the state to have young minds to shape from breakfast through dinner.
our local school will definitely qualify as we have a large number of “rural poor” here.
However - as with most great liberal ideas - there will be unforeseen costs and unfunded mandates.
Our local schools are already stretched to the limit - cutting staff. Cutting programs and considering shutting down some facilities altogether.
This is no time to start a “new” program that is going to involve additional costs to the schools.
exactly!
And part-time workers become full-time workers thereby qualifying for all sorts of bennies.
I hear ya.
I grew up in a rural area,, ate fat sandwiches for lunch sometimes.. remember lard on toast and beans if we had ‘em as a kid, other than joining the Marines, avoiding higher education, not running for higher office and staying off of the radar, worked for me. can’t make a good biscuit without a lil lard.. or so I hear. :-)
any lard sandwiches would have to come in a bag lunch starting next year now that our First Lady has taken over the program.
With the new regs the lunch prices could double.
Once again - libs wind up hurting those they claim to care about.
“Just a step or 2 more and we’ll have full time institutional care for kids whose “parents who are away from home for long hours”
Dope dealing is long hard work.”
____________________________________________________________
Already there. I know a family whose mother receives free day care for her two pre-schoolers, along with food stamps and a welfare check. The kids go to daycare five days a week while she “looks” for a job. This has gone on since last summer.
Lots of folks in the Boston area still call it supper,but only when it’s cooked at home.
When going out it’s dinner.
Breakfast, lunch, and now supper. Gee, how about orphanages?
And most of them are already fat. Do you think for a minute if there were thousands of emaciated children in the US it wouldn't be on TV 24/7? Go to any impoverished area in the US and you'll see fat kids lumbering along.
If the Federal Government wants to help kids, they could start by forsaking their insane desire to destroy kids’ parents. But of course the Federal Government wants to help only themselves. Caring about kids is a scam.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.