U.S. Senator Pat Roberts, R-Kan., Chairman of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry, today announced the Committee will hold a business meeting on Sept. 17 to markup bipartisan legislation reauthorizing child nutrition programs.
Chairman Roberts is working with Ranking Member Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., and other Committee members to craft a reauthorization package that increases efficiency, effectiveness, flexibility and integrity.
“We must reauthorize these programs so children across America can and will have healthy meals available at school," Roberts said. "Unfortunately, there are significant error rates and improper payment levels in school meal programs. We need to improve the administration of these programs to reduce errors but do so in a way that does not layer additional federal bureaucracy and overreach on those feeding hungry schoolchildren.”
“I have traveled across Kansas, eating school lunches with students and meeting with nutrition directors. I keep hearing one word over and over again: flexibility. To me, that means we protect the gains already achieved by many school districts and provide assistance to other districts so all students will have healthy, filling meals.”
The package includes reauthorization of the Child Nutrition Act of 1966 and the Richard B. Russell National School Lunch Act.
The Agriculture Committee in May held a hearing on child nutrition reauthorization where members heard directly from school nutrition professionals and other stakeholders.
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