Right-wing group in a tizzy over public schools feeding poor kids

Over the last couple of years we've received a lot of comments and questions at N.C. Policy Watch about the title of this feature. More than a few conservatives have complained about the use of the term "radical right," arguing that it has been used unfairly and that we're somehow attempting to smear people or to portray them as subversives.

Many progressives on the other hand have complained that we pay far too much attention to the right. They argue that if we just ignored most of the hogwash emanating for the various outlets in the right-wing-o-verse, so too would just about everyone else. "Why give them any more attention than they deserve?" goes the reasoning.

As the topic of today's edition of the feature makes clear, however, neither of these critiques holds water.

The purpose of labeling various foolhardy acts and statements of the far right as "radical" is not to cast aspersions at anyone's sincerity or loyalty to the country (at least not unless someone is advocating for secession or armed insurrection). The purpose is to expose those acts and statements to public scrutiny and to demonstrate just how far back in history some ideologues are ready to take the country.

As for the concern that shining a light on the far right only encourages an impotent movement, one need look no further that the weekly news conferences of the North Carolina Senate and House Minority leaders to understand how influential it already is. Sure, conservative think tanks don't run the state on a daily basis, but anyone who discounts their influence – in the General Assembly, in the mainstream media, on the Internet, or in the corporate boardrooms where so much power does reside – is simply kidding themselves.

A classic example

Today's example of absurdly reactionary thought illustrates just how downright wacky and "radical" the right is willing to get and how damaging its policy recommendations can be. It can be found on page 5 of this month's edition of Carolina Journal, the newsletter of the Locke Foundation, in an article entitled "Despite Abuses, Char-Meck Expands School-Lunch Program."  

In the article, a Locke staffer makes the straight-faced argument that the free and reduced price lunch program of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg School District (CMSD) is a hotbed of corruption and waste because (gasp!) some kids may be receiving free or reduced priced food even though their families' incomes are over the official limits.

For those who may not be familiar with the American school lunch program for kids from low-income households, it works this way:

"The National School Lunch Program is a federally assisted meal program operating in over 101,000 public and non-profit private schools and residential child care institutions. It provides nutritionally balanced, low-cost or free lunches to more than 30.5 million children each school day in 2007….Any child at a participating school may purchase a meal through the National School Lunch Program. Children from families with incomes at or below 130 percent of the poverty level are eligible for free meals. Those with incomes between 130 percent and 185 percent of the poverty level are eligible for reduced-price meals, for which students can be charged no more than 40 cents. (For the period July 1, 2008, through June 30, 2009, 130 percent of the poverty level is $27,560 for a family of four; 185 percent is $39,220.)"

According to the Locke Foundation, however, CMSD is not sufficiently vigilant in purging its free lunch rolls of freeloading kids whose family incomes may have soared above these dizzying levels. Last year the group posted an almost incomprehensible online article claiming that "Confusion Reigns on School Lunch Guidelines." Now, in an apparent follow-up, the new article attempts to claim that there are "lingering questions about potential cheating among applicants."

Though it presents no substantive evidence to back up the claims of widespread cheating, the article leaves no stone unturned in advancing rumor and innuendo and pushing all the right buttons for conservative conspiracy theorists. It quotes one right-wing county commissioner as stating that there are "10,000 or more [children] who are on it and should not be" even though there is no explanation from where that number might have come. It also quotes a conservative Mecklenburg County school board member as stating that: "Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools chases free and reduced-lunch numbers like ACORN chases votes. It's the same attitude and activist mentality."    

Heaven forbid.

Reality check

Come on guys, give us a break.

No responsible person at CMSD or elsewhere supports fraud. All public agencies and systems should do their best within reason to assure that their resources are devoted to the people for whom they are designed. The Locke article, however, admits that CMSD has complied with federal requirements to conduct income verification efforts from a sample of families. Locke's beef with the schools is that they didn't then go further and conduct a comprehensive audit of the entire school lunch program.

But, of course, this would be a ridiculous result. We're not talking about military contractors or some other giant government vendor; we're talking about a local school district program that puts cafeteria food in the stomachs of poor, growing children.

Sure, a comprehensive audit might find some more families in which the mother's latest 50 cent raise at Wal-Mart or Denny's put the family officially "over-income." It might also just as likely find that a huge percentage of the "potential fraud" alleged in the article is really the result of the fact that many poor people simply moved and couldn't respond to the small scale audit that was conducted.

But what if an audit did turn up more over-income applicants? What then? Should the school system take all the parents to court to get back the cost of two months' worth of chicken nuggets and apple sauce? Put the kids to work washing dishes after school?

What do the Locke people think is going on? That there's some diabolical conspiracy amongst secretly affluent Charlotteans to game the school lunch program? Do these people have children? Have they ever been in a public school? Do they know how humiliating it often is for kids to be identified in the free lunch program or for their parents to ask for such help in the first place?

Honestly, of all the possible waste, fraud and abuse in modern society, THIS is what the Locke people are devoting their resources to – cracking down on the school lunch program? The possibility that some free lunch recipient's parents are earning 135% of the federal poverty guideline rather than 125%? What's next – an exposé on toilet paper theft from rest stops? An undercover sting on double-dippers at local food banks?   

Radically wrong

At its heart, this article is a classic example of how wildly and bizarrely off the rails a goodly chunk of the modern conservative movement has spun. At a time of profound national economic crisis and in which so many of our children are struggling to make it in a harsh and confusing world, the right-wing is worried that some of them might be getting a 50 cent price break on their grilled cheese and tater tots. To make matters worse, some blockheaded elected officials are apparently paying attention.

If ever there was an example of why somebody needs to keep track of and expose the work of such people, this is it.