School lunches

THE ISSUE

The Alabama House of Representatives rejected a well-meaning but flawed bill last week that would have required schools to submit their menus to state nutritionists for review.

The House of Representatives missed an opportunity last week to strengthen school nutrition programs when it narrowly rejected a bill that would have required lunch menus to be reviewed by a state

nutritionist.

The bill, sponsored by Rep. Ken Guin, D-Carbon Hill, would have created 11 school districts across the state and required them to hire a nutritionist. School lunch menus would have been reviewed by the nutritionist in advance. But - and here's the big flaw - schools would not have been required to follow the nutritionists' recommendations. So, it's not surprising that the House rejected the bill on a 46-38 vote. It didn't help that school superintendents opposed the bill because they said it represented a new bundle of red tape.

The truth of the matter is that Guin's bill would have been a pointless unfunded mandate if schools didn't have to follow nutritionists' recommendations. Why he removed the teeth from his bill is a bit of a mystery, but it should have been obvious to him and the bill's backers that without the provision of forcing schools to adhere to healthier lunch menus, the bill served no purpose.

Which is unfortunate, because anyone who has dined with a child at most public schools during the noon hour knows that what's on the menu isn't the healthiest fare in town. In too many schools, corn dogs, pizza, sloppy joes and other heavily processed foods dominate the menu. Sure, many schools now offer salads, but raw lettuce and carrots are only a small part of a healthy and nutritious diet.

Guin, to his credit, has become an advocate for healthy eating, especially for children. He has shaved his head and adopted a strict diet to highlight the large number of obese children in the United States. In this age of convenience, where both parents hold jobs or work two jobs to make financial ends meet, little time is available for the type of home cooking a previous generation thrived on. Today, dinner is often served piping hot from the microwave in a cardboard package.

Few people will ever wax nostalgic for the school lunch of yesteryear, but those of an older generation were rarely served weiners and pizza on a regular basis in the lunchroom, either. Vegetables were a staple of the school lunch, as were fruit cobbles and milk. Fortunately, fewer soft drinks are available in school vending machines, but it's also clear that school lunches are not what they should be.

We encourage Guin and his supporters to rewrite the bill and put some teeth in it, forcing schools to do an even better job of feeding students - some of whom don't get nutritious meals at home. It might cost a little more to improve school lunch menus, but the investment would be worth every penny spent.