Thank you for taking the time to listen to those of us who regard healthy nutrition as one of our most important aspects of our profession in the area of school nutrition.  I think that anyone in our business will agree that providing our youth with healthy options during the school day is essential.  It is only logical that we follow one set of regulations as opposed to one set by federal, one by state and an additional one set by the local wellness policies, which in many cases will have to be rewritten after the federal mandates are released.  In addition trying to find products to meet all three will be increasingly difficult not to mention the increased cost to these products due to the fact that manufacturers will have to develop several different options for the same product to meet different regulations. 

Another concern of many School Food Service departments is the “enforcing the new mandates” in other areas of the school campus.  Trying to monitor these products if there are more than one rule to follow will become an arduous task, especially for those responsible for monitoring these products who may know little about the regulations that is such a huge part of the school food service program.

The last point to be made, which is in agreement with SNA is that any products that are approved to be sold as a part of the national school breakfast or lunch should have no further restrictions when sold as an ala carte product.  A food that is healthy enough to be part of the lunch program should be healthy enough for a product that is served as a competitive food.