School Lunch Debt Continues Rise Into Thousands Prompting Consideration Of Collection Agency

Because the school lunch debt is continuing to rise, the Ellwood City Area School Board will vote on Thursday whether to hire an outside agency to collect that debt.

Richard Zarone, district business manager, said the debt has reached $3,600 already for the year. He said there would be no cost to hire an agency as it would paid by the fees incurred by the debtor. He said the four-tier process would include two warning letters, one certified warning letter, and then the matter would be turned over to the collection agency.

This proposed solution follows a good gesture in August by Baierl Toyota of Mars to pay off more than $20,000 in school lunch debt for Ellwood City Area School District.

During the September 9 school board meeting John Dzurina, Food Service Coordinator for the District reported the debt at $500 after just two weeks of students returning to classes.

When Baierl made its donation, school Superintendent Joe Mancini said he is noticing a trend in the school lunch debt rising, and he doesn’t see it getting better anytime soon.

“The recent lunch shaming law allowed for students to get a meal no matter what their debt was so this has put Districts into situations where students racked up a lot of debt.  In the past we could stop serving a reimbursable meal and serve an alternative meal, but a more recent change to that allows Districts to serve an alternative meal after a student reaches $50 in debt during the year,” Mancini said at that time.  “I know that many districts have gone to collection agencies to get the debt paid off. We have held off on that step but it may be something that we will have to do in order to make sure students don’t get so far behind in paying.”

Currently when a student is behind in paying for five school meals, a letter is sent to remind parents that they owe money. Then the process continues with subsequent letters.

The board and administrators urge parents to apply for free or reduced lunches. They can do so at SchoolCafe.com. Mancini said if any family needs assistance in filling out the applications, they are free to stop by the school. Mancini noted previously that even when in doubt of qualification parents should apply.

“On average, over 50 percent of the students in the Ellwood City Schools are on free or reduced meal programs and now we are starting to see other students who cannot afford to pay,” he said previously. “We encourage all parents to go online and fill out the free and reduced application because they may qualify even if they don’t think they will.”