BILL ANALYSIS �
Senate Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary
Senator Kevin de Le�n, Chair
AB 2449 (Bocanegra) - Pupils: Adequate Time to Eat
Amended: June 18, 2014 Policy Vote: Education 4-2
Urgency: No Mandate: Yes
Hearing Date: August 4, 2014
Consultant: Jacqueline Wong-Hernandez
This bill meets the criteria for referral to the Suspense File.
Bill Summary: AB 2449 requires school districts and county
offices of education (COEs) to ensure that each of their schools
provide students adequate time to eat after being served a meal.
Fiscal Impact:
School district / COE enforcement: Potentially significant
reimbursable mandate on school districts and COEs to "ensure
that each of the schools in their respective jurisdictions
provides their pupils adequate time to eat after being
served," as specified.
School site plan: Potentially significant local costs.
Requirements on schools to, in certain cases, coordinate
with the school district or COE to develop and begin
implementation of a plan to increase pupils' time to eat,
could be deemed a reimbursable state mandate; if it is,
aggregate statewide costs would be substantial.
Background: Existing law requires each school district or county
superintendent of schools serving kindergarten or any of grades
1 to 12, to provide for each needy student one nutritionally
adequate free or reduced-price meal during each schoolday.
(Education Code � 49550)
The California Department of Education (CDE) issued guidance to
schools in January 2013, recommending that each student has at
least 10 minutes for breakfast and at least 20 minutes for lunch
after being served. This guidance states that research indicates
that inadequate time to eat discourages students from buying and
eating complete lunches. The guidance further states that
waiting in line is the most commonly reported factor
contributing to student dissatisfaction with lunches.
Proposed Law: This bill requires school districts and COEs to
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ensure that each of their schools provide students adequate time
to eat after being served a meal, and states that the CDE has
determined that adequate time to eat is 20 minutes after being
served lunch.
This bill requires a school, if it determines that it is not
providing students with adequate time to eat, to coordinate with
the school district or COE and develop and begin to implement a
plan to increase students' time to eat commencing with the
2015-16 school year. This bill also authorizes a school district
or COE, to the extent that funds are available, to use federally
or state-regulated nonprofit school food service cafeteria
accounts to defray any allowable costs from that funding source
before considering other funding streams.
Staff Comments: This bill places new requirements on schools,
school districts, and COEs. Some of those requirements are
likely to be deemed by the Commission on State Mandates to be
reimbursable mandates on local educational agencies (LEAs);
others are less clear, primarily because those requirements are
triggered by the current practices of a school or school
district.
This bill requires all school districts and COEs to "ensure that
each of the schools in their respective jurisdictions provides
their pupils adequate time to eat after being served." This
places new oversight responsibilities on those entities to
assess and enforce adequate time to eat. Since existing law does
not require school districts and COEs to be involved in meal
duration times currently, this requirement is almost certain to
be considered to mandate a higher level of service from those
entities. In the sentence immediately following the requirement
to ensure adequate time to to eat after being served, the bill
states "the [CDE] specifies adequate time to eat as 20 minutes
after being served lunch." It is unclear whether school
districts and COEs are required to use the 20 minute standard in
"ensuring" that schools in their jurisdictions are providing
adequate time to eat. School districts and COEs are likely to be
eligible for reimbursement for new activities undertaken to
fulfill the mandate, which would likely include issuing
guidelines, coordinating with schools, and and
monitoring/evaluating schools' compliance. School districts can
elect to perform those activities now, and some do. For example,
the Los Angeles Unified School District (which is by far the
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state's largest) has issued guidelines to its schools and
continues to be involved in ensuring that schools provide
adequate time to eat. Those school districts that currently
already elect to take on those oversight and guidance activities
would also be eligible for reimbursement under mandate law.
This bill requires schools to self-assess, and determine whether
or not they are providing pupils with adequate time to eat.
Again, it is unclear whether schools are supposed to use the
stated CDE standard of 20 minutes after the last pupil is
served, or if the schools can set their own standards in making
a determination of adequate time.
Many schools will likely determine that they are, in fact,
providing adequate time to eat; nothing will change for those
schools. For schools that determine they are not providing
adequate time to eat, they will be required to coordinate with
their districts or COEs to "develop and begin to implement a
plan to increase pupils' time to eat commencing with the 2015-16
school year."
It is unclear whether, and to what degree, a school that
determines it is not providing adequate time to eat and must
take action to progress toward doing so, could successfully
claim reimbursement for the activities it undertakes to comply
with this bill. The extent of the requirements actually mandated
is unclear, as is whether meeting those requirements would
constitute a higher level of service for a school to provide to
its students. Some key considerations are as follows:
1) 20 minutes: Spliced between the mandate on school
districts and COEs to ensure schools provide adequate time
to eat, and the mandate for schools themselves to determine
whether or not they provide adequate time to eat, is this
sentence: "The department specifies adequate time to eat as
20 minutes after being served lunch." While the language
does not specifically state that a school's determination
of time adequacy, and a school district or COE's
enforcement of time adequacy, be based on the 20 minute
standard, it is certainly implied by the sentence and its
placement in the statute.
2) Initial determination: The easiest option for a school
to meet this bill's requirements is to self-determine that
it does provide adequate time, based on its own standards.
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In that instance, a school could submit a mandate claim for
whatever process is undertook to evaluate and make that
determination, including staff time. School districts can
aggregate their schools' claims; if even half of the
approximately 1,000 school districts claim the $1,000
minimum mandate amount, costs would be $500,000. If LEAs
interpret 20 minutes to be the standard for the amount of
time the last pupil served should be allotted to eat, more
schools may find they do not meet the standard and they
will almost certainly file mandate claims for activities
they undertake to rise to the standard.
3) The plan: This bill requires schools that do not meet
adequate time standards to coordinate with their school
districts or COEs to develop a plan to move toward meeting
the standard. Requiring coordination to develop a
school-specific plan is likely to be deemed by the
Commission on State Mandates (CSM) to be reimbursable. What
is less clear, is the degree to which implementing the
contents of the plan (which are determined by the local
entities developing it) will be reimbursable.
4) Implementation: For schools that were required to
develop a plan, this bill also requires that they "begin to
implement" it in the 2015-16 school year. The CSM could
determine that since this bill requires schools to develop
a plan to increase time to eat and begin implementing it,
that the activities included in the plan are reimbursable.
If so, it is possible that the CSM would determine that
anything a school does to meet the requirements of time
adequacy, however inefficient or expensive, are mandated by
this bill (since the bill delegates the substance of the
plans to LEAs). In that case, the state will likely be
responsible for reimbursing tens of millions of dollars;
especially, once a broad test claim is successful and LEAs
can add on to it. Conversely, the CSM could decide that
allowing pupils adequate time to eat the meals that schools
are already required to serve to them is not a higher level
of service, and not reimbursable.
5) Cafeteria funds: This bill has a funding source that can
likely be used by schools to defray at least some of the
costs of implementation activities, depending on what
schools may choose to do to increase eating time. The CSM
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may determine that the availability of cafeteria funds
mitigates some of the mandates in this bill. Regardless of
a mandate, this places pressure on cafeteria funds to be
used to create systems or purchase technology in order to
advance time adequacy instead of for other allowable
purposes.