WCPS to teachers: Use your children to boost lunch numbers

Financial consultant Aaron Beaulieu hinted to the Wayne County Board of Education Monday that the school district is not serving enough meals to support its Child Nutrition budget for the 2020-21 school year — and warned that WCPS did not have the fund balance or excess savings to cover what could be a shortfall in reimbursements from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Beaulieu isn’t the first person to point out the dilemma.

In fact, district leaders have repeatedly noted that cafeteria staff, supplies and food cost money, but the federal reimbursement that offsets those costs is based on the number of meals served. COVID-19 — and the impact it has had on on-site attendance — has greatly reduced that number and will, unless things change, mean less money from the federal government.

“No one in this district has any idea where your Child Nutrition budget is going. You’re trying to provide food. You’re trying to provide meals across the district. Those are based upon USDA reimbursements,” Beaulieu said. “You’re keeping the level of staffing, but I can tell you, they don’t match serving X number of kids every day a breakfast and a lunch. You have that as a $10 million budget, but you need to match how your revenues are doing against your monthly expenditures.”

And given the fact that it took millions in cuts to balance the 2020-21 budget — and 2021-22 will require more cuts — there is simply no wiggle room. In other words, any shortfall would again throw the numbers off at a time when WCPS can ill-afford another financial headache.

Less than 72 hours after Beaulieu’s presentation, Assistant Superintendent Dr. Tim Harrell sent this email to every principal in the district:

Several verified school administrators and teachers who spoke to the New Old North on the condition of anonymity out of fear of retaliation said they were taken aback by what they characterized as an “unethical” mandate from Central Office for staff members to sign their own children up for school meals — particularly since many of those students are enrolled either at other WCPS schools or in the district’s Virtual Academy, and the meals would potentially never be taken from the cafeteria, much less consumed.

One administrator said they were conflicted about passing along the instructions to staff.

“I know we need the money, but this feels wrong. I pride myself on leading by example and I wouldn’t do it. But now I’m being told to require them to help the district inflate school lunch numbers because we’re in a budget crisis,” they said. “I’m not sure messing with the federal government is the direction we want to go right now.”

Another characterized it as “unacceptable.”

“The only way to fix nutrition is to bring all the kids back and with the virus, unfortunately that’s just not possible right now. So nobody has a good answer for COVID that we can actually accomplish, but I don’t know how wasting food or making liars out of our team members and fudging numbers is graceful,” they said. “Where’s the logic in signing up for food when your child is at home? In most cases, it’s going to go to waste. And why would you get meals for your children at this school when your children go to that school? The whole thing sounds iffy.”

And a teacher who told their principal that there was no need for school meals at their house because their child was enrolled in Virtual Academy said she was told to add the child’s name to the list anyway.

“(They) said, ‘This is above my head. Just put the name on the list. They don’t care if they have to throw the food away. They just need the numbers so we don’t have to fire cafeteria staff,’” the teacher said. “So, I asked, ‘If I put my child on this list, am I an accessory to fraud?’ (They) threw their hands up and that was the end of it. I never did get an answer.”

Requests for comment from WCPS, the N.C. Department of Public Instruction and the U.S. Department of Agriculture have not yet been fulfilled. In the event they are, we will update this story.