A bit of background....
The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) has been involved in school lunch/nutrition issues for decades. The USDA Child Nutrition Program oversees this particular issue.

In Texas the Child Nutrition Program was a department with the Texas Education Agency (TEA), but in the recent set of government re-organizations, it was moved under the Texas Department of Agriculture - effective July 2003 - to better align with the Federal structure.

There has long been a policy regarding "Food of Minimal Nutritional Value" (FMNV). The epidemic increase in childhood obesity and related Type II diabetes has raised concerns nationwide.

For 2003-2004, the FMNV policy became even stricter in Texas www.agr.state.tx.us/foodnutrition/policy/ntn_fmnv_policy.htm) School districts must implement that policy. It covers 4 areas: soda water, water ices, chewing gum and certain candies.

Basically, Elementary schools cannot serve/allow to be provided any FMNV products, anywhere on campus, anytime during the school day. Middle Schools are regulated mostly at meal times. Penalties for non-compliance could include loss of the school's meal allowance for the day and the school having to reimburse food costs.

Here's a good overview of what's allowed/prohibited www.tcta.org/legal/laws/fmnvguide.htm

Definitely the policy is restrictive, but depending on how the school district implements it there are some exceptions. So, for example candy-coated popcorn might be prohibited, but not regular popcorn. Candy with nuts may be acceptable (because nuts have nutritional value). Note that the school could choose a more restrictive policy like outlawing ALL candy. Here's one example of a school that's already published its new policy:

www.cfisd.net/dept2/food/html/fmnv.html

One last note: in Texas we are now in the last week of our state's fiscal year. This is a very crazy time as everyone closes out their books, staff take vacation about to be lost, not to mention agencies preparing for the additional reorganizations and laws that take affect Sept. 1st. If you need more information at the State level, this week and next may not be the best time to ask.

4/16/04 updated some out-of-date links

[ 04-16-2004, 09:54 PM: Message edited by: JHB ]

Hi oneoldmom -

I haven't read it, but I've followed these proposals pretty closely. I'm going to wager that your principal's or your district's reading of the new regulations is overly strict. I'd suggest getting a copy of the actual bill that was passed and perhaps a copy of any regs that have come down from the Dept. of Agriculture (why the dept. of agriculture is involved in schools, I do not know).

Often, law changes lead to a sort of "telephone game" effect with PTOs at the end of the chain. The result: lots of misinterpretation. I'd slow down and make sure all the facts are staright before I amde drastic, drastic changes.

Tim

Before I start: if you haven't seen the article, you should ask your administrators about it.

We were told today that those of us in Texas can no longer sell or distribute food or other edibles, including certain drinks to any child in our schools. Teachers may not either. We were given a list of all restricted items. All candy except chocolate, absolutley no sodas or other carbonated beverages and popcorn. Many other items are included on this list. We don't sell much choclate to the students in our candy sales. They like all the other candy. This has made us have to stop our candy and cookie sales. We were going to start selling popcorn, but now that's a no-no. If we are caught even giving the kids any of these items and the Texas Department of Agriculture catches us, we basically lose all of our federal funding (both cafeteria, any Title I monies, etc). Parents may send these items to school with their children, so long they don't share with other children.

Now, I've got a few questions:

1. Does anyone have other ideas as to what we can replace these sales with? We generally average $600 - $700 (total, profit) per school year on these sales.

2. Any treat ideas that are low cost that would not conflict with these regulations (other than toys they'll play with).

3. Our class parties (Christmas, Valentine's Day, Easter) have always had soda options and candy (mainly Easter). Any suggestions as to what parents can donate to the classes that could take the place of these. Drinks are limited to plain water and juices that are actually juice and not flavored water(these can be so boring!). We can have sports drinks as I was told.

4. Would candy in the brochure fundraisers and cookie dough sales be affected by this?

Any help would be much appreciated!