Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions

Floor Speech

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Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, I am pleased to join my colleague from Minnesota, Senator Smith, in introducing the School Food Modernization Act to assist schools in updating outdated kitchen equipment, allowing them to provide healthier meals to students.

School meals play a vital role in the lives of our young people. More than 95,000 schools participate in the National School Lunch program, serving upwards of 30 million children each day. Many children consume up to half their daily caloric intake at school, and some get their most nutritious meal of the day at school instead of at home. Because school meals are a significant source of daily nutrition for so many, we must consistently aim to improve the program to best serve students.

Schools built decades ago often lack the equipment and infrastructure necessary to do more than reheat and serve one or two meal options each day. In 2014, it was estimated that Maine schools alone would need $58.8 million for equipment infrastructure upgrades needed to serve healthy meals to all of our students. I am pleased that the Agriculture Appropriations Subcommittee has consistently recognized this need, and in Fiscal Year 2019 appropriated $30 million for School Equipment Assistance Grants. Through this funding, Maine will be able to competitively award $85,470 to school districts in need of updated equipment.

Nutrition directors at Mount View High School in Thorndike, Maine, used USDA Equipment Assistance funding to purchase a blast chiller to accommodate increased quantities of fruits and vegetables. Thanks to this equipment, the school is now able to quickly and safely preserve the food's freshness while reducing spoilage. Other schools have acquired hot holding cabinets, mobile food carts, and even combination ovens, which prepare foods faster and maintain more vitamin and nutrient content compared with many other cooking methods. Our legislation would codify and improve this successful grant program to better meet the growing need nationwide.

The School Food Modernization Act seeks to help school food service personnel offer a wide variety of nutritious and appealing meals to all students. First, the bill would provide targeted grant assistance to supply the seed funding needed to upgrade kitchen infrastructure or to purchase high-quality equipment. Second, it would establish a loan guarantee assistance program within USDA to help schools acquire new equipment. Finally, to aid school food services personnel in running successful, healthy programs, the legislation would authorize USDA to provide support on a competitive basis to highly qualified third-party trainers to develop and administer training and technical assistance, including online programs.

I appreciate that some provisions of this legislation were incorporated into previous versions of the Children Nutrition Reauthorization legislation approved by the Senate Agriculture Committee. I encourage our colleagues to continue to support school kitchen equipment needs as the reauthorization process continues.

Mr. President, if our school children are going to be able to learn and succeed, they need their minds and bodies to be fully nourished. This bill would help us achieve that goal.

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