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Bill Could Impact How Schools Budget For Child Nutrition Program

As more North Carolina Public Schools reopen for full-time in-person instruction, state lawmakers are proposing several related measures. KERI BROWN/WFDD

The Guilford County Board of Education is whittling down what issues it will focus on in the coming months.  Discussions include a statehouse bill that would dictate how districts pay for administrative overhead costs associated with providing school meals.

The new bill being considered by lawmakers would change the payment process. 

Districts would have to have three months of operating balance available at year-end before it can charge the school nutrition fund for those indirect costs. The current statute requires one month. These indirect costs are an allowable expense under the federally run USDA program.

The measure also says the State Department of Public Instruction will calculate a district's operating budget for this program.

Nora Carr, chief of staff for the school system, says all of this is problematic because they would no longer have the opportunity to recoup these expenses.

"GCS would have to absorb about $2 million a year," says Carr. "And so it would mean taking money away from somewhere else in the district.”

Carr says more than 66% of GCS students qualify for free or reduced price meals

Follow WFDD's Keri Brown on Twitter @kerib_news

Keri Brown is a multi-award winning reporter and host at 88.5 WFDD. She has been honored with two regional Edward R. Murrow awards for her stories about coal ash, and was named the 2015 radio reporter of the year by the Radio Television Digital News Association of the Carolinas (RTDNAC).Although she covers a variety of topics, her beats are environmental and education reporting.Keri comes to the Triad from West Virginia Public Broadcasting, where she served as the Chief Bureau Reporter for the Northern Panhandle. She produced stories for the state's Public Television and Radio programs and was honored by the West Virginia Associated Press Broadcasters Association for her feature and enterprise reporting.She also served as an adjunct instructor at Wheeling Jesuit University and Bethany College in West Virginia. She worked with the Center for Educational Technologies in Wheeling, WV, and other NASA centers across the country to develop several stories about the use of science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) concepts in the classroom.Keri's journalism career began at WTRF-TV 7 in Wheeling. She worked in several roles at the station, including the head assignment editor. She also was a field producer and assignment manager at WPGH-TV Fox 53 in Pittsburgh.Keri is a graduate of Ohio University. When she's not in the studio or working on a story, she enjoys watching college football with her family, cooking, and traveling.Keri is always looking for another great story idea, so please share them with her. You can follow her on Twitter @kerib_news.

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