Hello Fellow Concerned Community Members, I'm happy to report that many positive initiatives are in the works and its partly because of your support! With your efforts we were able to get the district's attention! Most importantly, Mary Callahan, Assistant Superintendent for Business was in attendance she agreed to present a proposal from Julia Van Loon to the board to see if we could have Julia work with Jim Bigley on the upcoming bid!!!!!! Jim Bigley is independent from the district and writes contracts etc. for the district. Jim Is expected to attend the next meeting on Feb. 14thto hear out our wants and desires for the upcoming bid. The administration has emphasized that 15-18 percent of our students are on free or reduced lunch and our district is subsidized by the Federal Government. Since we receive subsidies we must abide by the USDA Guidelines and this doesn't give us much flexibility for food reform as we need to support the needs of all children in the district. That being said, the nutrition committee would at least be able to implement the following into the new bid: -Eliminate GMO's in high risk areas (i.e.: corn, tomatoes, soy, squash, canola, eggs, meat & dairy) -Eliminate Antibiotics in our meats -Re-asses the Salad options at our schools -Change the Corn oil in our salad dressings to be replaced with Canola and/or Olive Oil -Re evaluating our selection of Yogurts (keeping in mind the sugar levels) -Ask about adding Hummus and Butternut Squash The committee also discussed the benefits of each school having an active Nutrition Committee where people can voice their concerns and be informed. FYI Our current contract includes the following and Aramark is supposed to be abiding by the following: -we have scratch cooking -we make our own salad dressings -we have no high fructose corn syrup ( we buy special syrups and jellys) -we use Boards head cold cuts -Fresh salad is offered every day as an option -No canned vegetables (except tomato sauce) -whole muscle meat in poultry -100 % ground beef - no fillers