Usually when we have an announcement, we're excited to tell you about upcoming events or bring you information you can use. Today, we're posting this to ask for your help, and about 60 seconds of your time.
Congress is getting ready to visit the Child Nutrition Act this month. This act provides federal funding to public school lunch programs, and is reauthorized every five years. Right now, this program only provides schools with $1 per child to buy ingredients. This is not enough!
This is our last chance to voice our concerns before Congress revisits this act. We need to urge our senators to provide more funding for healthy and nutritious food for school children. You can help us make one final push to legislators to remind them how important this act is. If you have the time, please CALL or EMAIL your senators TODAY. Tell them it's time for Congress to help schools serve real food!
If you can CALL:
- You can reach Sen. Diane Feinstein's office at (202) 224-3841.
- You can reach Sen. Barbara Boxer's office at (202) 22-3553.
- You can find talking points below.
If you can EMAIL, please go to the Slow Food USA website here, where you'll find an email form that will send an email to your local legislators. The letter is already written; you simply need to enter your name and email and click send. It will take you less than 60 seconds.
You can also FORWARD this email to friends and family. Anyone can join Slow Food's efforts to ensure healthy, nutritious food in schools. All it takes in a quick phone call or email. You can also direct them to Slow Food USA's website for more information.
The National School Lunch Program was created in 1946 "to safeguard the health and wellbeing of the Nation's children." It is supposed to ensure that no child goes without a healthy meal every day. But school lunches are not providing healthy food. Even school systems with good intentions lack the funds to purchase and prepare fresh, healthy meals.
As of today, over 40,000 people have signed Slow Food's Time for Luch petition or sent letters to their Senators urging them to better fund this program. We hope you will join us by CALLING or EMAILING legislators TODAY.
Time for Lunch Talking Points
We are asking our elected officials to:
- Find the funding to give school lunch programs more than $1 per child per day.
- Approve the Child Nutrition Program and School Lunch Protection Act of 2009. This will protect kids from junk food sold in vending machines, cafeterias, and school stores.
- Guarantee $50 million for Farm-to-School programs, which link schools to local farms and teach healthy eating.
If you can CALL your Senator, here are some talking points you can convey:
- The main barrier to improving school lunch is lack of funding. Adequate funding could help schools buy directly from local farms, cook meals from scratch, and help children learn to make good food choices.
- Fully funding school lunch and supporting farm-to-school programs will allow schools to buy and cook local food. This is both an educational opportunity for students and an economic engine for creating jobs in local economies.
- Investing in real food now will save billions in health care costs later. The health of America's children is the health of our nation. Our kids need wholesome, nutritious food to stay healthy.
- When congress renews the child nutrition act, they must:
- Raise school funding at least $1 per child per day
- Strengthen nutrition standards
- Make Farm-to-School funding mandatory
Need inspiration? Just stare at this unhealthy school lunch while you make the phone call:
Want to learn more about healthy school lunches? Join Slow Food Urban San Diego at the Natural History Museum on February 18 for a lecture on the Road to Healthy Meals in Our Schools.
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