The Detroit News published an op-ed by Michigan Congresswoman Candice Miller on February 24th, where the Congresswoman slammed the nutrition standards established under the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010. In her op-ed Representative Miller calls the nutrition standards (which guarantee more fruits, vegetables, and whole grains in students’ meals and allows the Secretary of Agriculture to set standards for all foods sold in schools) as “nanny state regulations.”

Representative Miller goes on to write:

“School supervisors have better things to do than spending more and more time and resources policing the lunchroom or resolving disputes about how much ranch dressing students should be allowed to consume with their raw carrots (true story). Federal agricultural officials have more important concerns than issuing decrees about whether cupcakes can be sold at local PTO fundraisers.”

Representative Miller’s misinformed position is one that has been pushed by opponents to the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act since its passage four years ago. What they fail to realize is that school-based meals don’t just feed those students who have economically stable households and refrigerators full of food at home. What I pointed out in the comments section of this article is that 16 million children live in food insecure households nationwide. For many of these children school-based meals are the only healthy meal they receive each day.

It is very much within our responsibility (both as a community and a government) to guarantee that not only access is made to as many hungry children as possible, but that the meals they receive reach guidelines set out by doctors and nutritionists (not in fact bureaucrats as the op-ed wrongly states) in order to provide them with healthy food. This is a fact that most strongly should be understood in Representative Miller’s home state of Michigan where 24.8% of children live in food insecurity and 907,684 children participate in the School Lunch Program.

Attacks on healthy school-based foods like the one Representative Miller launched will only be heating up over the next year as Congress begins to reauthorize the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act. What do you think about school-based meals and healthier options? We would love for you to share your experience here: http://www.momsrising.org/member_stories/topic/untitled_601/?ak_proof=1&akid=3338.2.A2pEGl&rd=1&t=10.