School lunch prices nudge upward
Date: 8/15/2012
By G. Michael Dobbs
news@thereminder.comCHICOPEE — For Chicopee students, the announcements made by School Superintendent Richard Rege Jr. at the Aug. 8 School Committee meeting truly signaled the end of summer vacation.
Rege noted the start dates for Chicopee Public Schools with grades one through nine reporting back on Sept. 4, grades 10 through 12 on Sept. 5 and pre-kindergarten to kindergarten on Sept.10.
Bus schedules, which Rege said have not changed very much, will be published Aug. 15.
Parents will see one change, though, as the price of school meals has increased. Due to new federal mandates aimed at improving the quality of school meals, Rege explained.
The new rates are elementary schools paid lunch, $1.75; elementary schools reduced lunch 40 cents; middle and high schools paid lunch, $2; middle and high schools reduced lunch, 40 cents; elementary paid breakfast 60 cents; elementary school reduced breakfast 20 cents; and middle and high school paid breakfast $1; and middle and high school reduced breakfast, 20 cents.
Rege said the quality of the meals prepared by the district are "outstanding" and the even with the increased price "are still an exceptional bargain."
Mayor Michael Bissonnette said the school administration "had over a decade held the prices [on school lunches]." He added Chicopee's school meal program was one of the few in the state that "ran in the black."
Bissonnette said that thanks to a City Council that consolidates three city accounts into one masonry improvements at the Lambert-Lavoie School and Szetela Early Childhood School can prove forward.
A problem with a leaking water tank at Chicopee High School is being addressed as well. Bissonnette said the tank's warranty is being examined and there is still $22,000 available in the high school's building account that could be used if necessary.
The renovations at the former Chicopee High School so the building could be used as a new middle school would be completed by the summer of 2015 under "the worst case scenario," Bissonnette said. He said the project is still being planned at the $30 million level so the city's part of that budget would only be $6 million.
School Committee member Donald Lamothe asked Bissonnette about the former Chapin School, noting the property has weeds and high grass as well broken windows. The mayor explained those problems would be addressed as the city plans to put the property back on the market for sale. Bissonnette said there had been a buyer to transform the school into condominiums, but the deal fell through at the start of the recession in 2008.
The School Committee approved the $25,829 bid made by GMH Fence to install a fence at the Belcher Memorial School to better ensure the safety of the students and the committee also approved the contracts between the Metropolitan Springfield YMCA and the district for the continuation of a before-school program at the Belcher Memorial School and at Sgt. Robert R. Litwin School.
Members of the committee praised the program which is allows parents to drop their children off early in order to get to work on time.
