Thank you for the opportunity to offer comments in regards to the issue of competitive foods in schools.  My name is Karen Arthur and I am the School Nutrition Supervisor for Bedford County Public Schools in Bedford, VA.  We have approximately 10,330 students in our division with the  majority of those students paying full price for school meals.  We have only 37% of our students who qualify for free or reduced priced meals.  So, alacarte sales are very important to our division in order to "pay our own way" which is what the division expects us to do. 

We, like most other school divisions in the state of Virginia receive  no local funding from our counties or school divisions.  We are expected to pay all of our own bills, employee salaries, employee benefits and any other expenses that we incur.  We do this only from the funds that we collect in our school cafeterias each day, federal reimbursement and the small amount of state reimbursement that we receive.  The Healthy Hunger Free Kids Act (HHFKA) of December 2010 imposed stringent changes to School Nutrition Programs.  The changes that were made to our school meals in order to meet the required regulations resulted in a 6% decrease in lunch participation for my division.  A decrease in participation results in a decrease in funds generated for the program. 

I ask you to consider how imposing further restrictions on competitive foods will affect school nutrition programs and their ability to "keep their head above water".  The focus of school nutrition programs is and should continue to be providing healthy choices to students not trying to ensure that three different sets of regulations are being met for competitive food sales.  I support the School Nutrition Associations position that federal competitive foods regulations should govern school nutrition programs.  Thank you for your time.