CEO: Schools reject offer to pay students' late lunch bills

[Judi Lynn]

This discussion thread was locked as off-topic by Autumn (a host of the Latest Breaking News forum).

Source: Associated Press


Mark Scolforo, Associated Press
Updated 5:44 pm CDT, Tuesday, July 23, 2019

The president of a Pennsylvania school board whose district had warned parents behind on lunch bills that their children could end up in foster care has rejected a CEO's offer to cover the cost, the businessman said Tuesday.

Todd Carmichael, chief executive and co-founder of Philadelphia-based La Colombe Coffee, said he offered to give Wyoming Valley West School District $22,000 to wipe out bills that generated the recent warning letter to parents.

But school board President Joseph Mazur rejected the offer during a phone conversation Monday, Carmichael spokesman Aren Platt said Tuesday. Mazur argued that money is owed by parents who can afford to pay, Platt said.

"The position of Mr. Carmichael is, irrespective of affluence, irrespective of need, he just wants to wipe away this debt," Platt said.


Read more: https://www.chron.com/news/education/article/CEO-Schools-denied-my-offer-after-warning-on-14116676.php

[Beakybird]

1. What a wanker to refuse the $$.

[procon]

2. The school board seems more interested in

humiliating and shaming the children and ecking out some financial revenge on their parents instead of agreeing to a solution where everyone wins.

[PSPS]

3. So, it isn't really about the money after all. Mazur is just a sadist.

[DURHAM D]

5. No. The affluent parents are jerks. nt

[Flaleftist]

12. Who says they are affluent?

This is all I could find:

The median income for a household in the borough was $33,576, and the median income for a family was $44,087. Males had a median income of $33,015 versus $24,718 for females. The per capita income for the borough was $18,428. About 5.7% of families and 9.9% of the population were below the poverty line, including 14.9% of those under age 18 and 9.3% of those age 65 or over.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wyoming,_Pennsylvania

[cstanleytech]

17. The median is just the average and it does not preclude someone far more wealthy from living

in an area and the same for someone being far more poor living in the area.
Not to mention cost of living can impact on that as well as some areas of the country a 15 dollar an hour wage such as San Franscisco people would struggle due to the housing costs.

[Flaleftist]

19. That median is well below the national average.

Which makes it sound like a fairly low income area. That's not really where most affluent people live. I don't see any proof that the parents who owe money are affluent.

[PSPS]

20. There are no "affluent parents" in that district. Poorest in the state.

[DURHAM D]

4. Good.

I know a lot of people got wound up about this story but I thought from the get go that it was well-off parents not paying their debts because they did not think the school could do a damn thing about it.

I learned that a lot of people are not aware of the National Lunch Program that was signed into law by President Truman about 50 years ago - a program usually referred to as the "Free and Reduced Lunch" program.

Also, most schools have a list of organizations, churches or agencies that will step up and pay the lunch bill for kids in changed circumstances or some family emergency. Sometimes this is managed by a social worker or a counselor and sometimes by the food service staff.

During the school year kids who qualify get a bag of food to take home on Fridays.

I live in a medium size town and during summer there are four places where kids and a parent can go to get free lunch every weekday and two places to pick up food for the weekend.

[safeinOhio]

7. IF that be the case, then it

could be done on a case by case bases. I'd bet not all of them are well off and screw the ones that are. I hate when individuals are all lumped together.

[delisen]

6. So School Bd Pres does not want bill paid after all

He has a different agenda.

[3Hotdogs]

8. Maybe its only N.J.

I retired from teaching, 2006.

Every September, kids were sent home with forms about free lunch. Parents had to check one of two boxes..... need lunch or don't want to apply.

Means tested families were given free lunch.

[Farmer-Rick]

9. So it is not about a poor school that can't afford free lunch for starving children

Since this school obviously doesn't really need the money, why don't they give everyone free lunches? If it is about teaching a lesson, let's teach compassion instead hate and cruelty.

This school board pres is just another psychopath in power. He needs to be voted out.

[Lonestarblue]

11. We don't know whether parents can afford lunches.

I was curious and looked up some information about this school district. It’s in Luzerne County, described as being in the heart of northeastern Pennsylvania coal country. Unemployment is 5.4%, higher than the national average, and average income is a bit over $25,000 a year, also lower than the national average. Given the problems in the coal industry, unemployment may actually be higher.

The school board lists only men, with the exception of a lone woman identified as a secretary, so I’m assuming that this is a very conservative, Republican part of the state. Data about school performance was somewhat confusing, but both elementary and high schools seem to be performing below state standards. And we all know that family income is one of the biggest predictors of student achievement in school.

I can’t draw a conclusion based on what I know, but I wouldn’t jump to a conclusion that these parents could well afford to pay their bills and just refused to do so. That may be the case, but we just don’t have the facts.

[Igel]

13. This has been done in other school districts.

Either the policy of mandatory payments was rescinded (by board vote or by administrative fiat) or somebody stepped in to pay and remove any debt.

The following year the result was fairly consistent across states, across type of district (rural/urban/suburban)--a lot of parents concluded that either paying the reduced fee wasn't necessary or, even worse, that only suckers paid it. So if there were $10k in unpaid lunches in one year, the next year there could be $15k, $20k, or even more. (And if the debt wasn't forgiven in later years, well, it was something the parents had and now that was taken away from them and the rules kept changing.)

So if you let the $22k be forgiven this year, next year you might be looking at a $33k hole in the budget, maybe a bit less or perhaps a bit more, the same problem but fewer benefactors.

[MicaelS]

15. I do not care what's happened elsewhere.

Threatening parents they could lose their children is absolutely unacceptable.

[rickford66]

10. Can't he pay the parents directly so they in turn can pay the tab ?

[marble falls]

14. "Its not about the money, it's about some sort of ass-hatted principle, dammit."

[ananda]

16. What is wrong with people?

They just want to separate parents and children
over everything else?

Jeezus

[LogicFirst]

18. How can kids be smart

when school board members are stupid?

[Autumn]

21. Locking. This does not meet the SOP for LBN Please repost in GD

Thank you.

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