Wyoming Valley West School District is one of the poorest in Pennsylvania. Some families are so bad off that they are facing food insecurity, as marked by their childrens' unpaid school lunch bills. Instead of offer free lunch and breakfast like many school districts do,
this district has decided to go after parents whose children have higher than a $10 unpaid bill. They are going so far as to threaten to take those children from their family and put them in foster care!Will you sign on and tell this school district to cut out these abhorrent threats to separate families?This area used to be a big coal mining area and no longer is, thus the poverty in the area. But using the threat of taking children away from their parents to collect debts as small as $10 is a disgusting move. The foster care system should be a last resort for them there is actual abuse or neglect, not as a debt collecting system. If parents are having a hard time paying for their kids lunches, chances are the kid is already struggling, separating them from their parent will not help.
Instead, the school district should get the money from tax revenue or state grants and offer free breakfast and lunch so that families can stay together and children can have consistent food. We know that hungry kids can't effectively learn, let alone find emotional stability. It looks like they got federal funding to support five years of school lunches and now they just need to wipe all the lunch debt free and never threaten families in this way again.
Sign on if you think the school district needs to promise never to use the threat of the foster care system as a means for collecting debts!