Mayor steps up to the plate for school nutrition programs in city
I remember as a child, attending school in what was then one of Toronto’s poorest neighbourhoods, being jealous of friends whose parents would give them a couple of dollars instead of sending them to school with a lunch. They’d go out and get a bag of chips, a Fun Dip and a pop while I was stuck sipping soup out of a Thermos or eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and carrot sticks. Imagine: junk food for lunch, every day!
It was only later that I realized the scrounged spare change they brought was not a sign of privilege but of deprivation; that the kind of diet they were eating represented a real hurdle to both their physical and mental health; that rather than feeling jealous, I should feel lucky.
And in retrospect, I realize that’s why parents at my school eventually founded a “breakfast club” school nutrition program to ensure all students could start their day with a belly full of healthier food. It was around then, or shortly after, that Mayor Olivia Chow (then a school board trustee) and her late husband, Jack Layton (then a city councillor), helped found a citywide school nutrition program based on recognizing the same need.
The premise is simple. Students should be fed, and when they are, they are healthier and learn better. The program has grown (it now feeds 220,000 students according to Chow, with funding from the city, province and private donors), but it remains limited to certain schools in certain areas of the city.
Chow has never stopped being proud of that program, citing it often as among her political achievements when she was running for mayor. When she was serving as an MP in Ottawa, she introduced a (then-unsuccessful) motion to implement a federal school nutrition program.
On multiple occasions that I’ve spoken with her in the nearly one year since she got elected, she’s emphasized expanding those school programs as a priority for her.
And the federal budget this month offered an opportunity to advance that priority with its new $1.8 billion in funding for school nutrition programs.
Even before that budget was formally unveiled, Chow was hyping up the potential to me when she visited the Star for a podcast. She estimated then the annual federal funding across the country might be $220 million. “If we can get 10 per cent of it, that’s $20 million … That’s like doubling the program that we have,” said Chow. “That’s very, very significant.” (The city currently contributes about $18 million to these programs, according to city officials, representing about 50 per cent of their current funding.)
So it was no surprise that after the federal budget announcement made it official, Chow made acting on it her top priority at city council meeting two weeks ago. At the time of the meeting, the city government was still reeling from the rage of the fiasco over vacant home tax billing. That was also on the agenda (listed as the mayor’s second key item), and other things like alcohol in parks and increases in parking fines were more likely to grab headlines.
But nothing on the agenda was as personal for Chow. “This program is dear to my heart, it’s a program my late husband and I designed many, many years ago,” she said at the meeting.
“We’re encouraged to see the federal government has committed … that money has the potential to make a huge difference in the lives of children across the country. We can do so much more.”
The specific item asked the provincial government to act immediately to secure the funding from Ottawa and pass it along, as well as asking them to increase their own contribution, and asked for reports on a plan to make school food programs across Toronto universal.
The mayor urged her colleagues, “Let’s enhance the program, let’s get the kids happy and learning, let’s make it universal.” City council approved the motion unanimously (25-0, with one absent).
It’s a program whose potential expansion could be amazingly meaningful for kids across the city, even if in the federal budget news cycle it was overshadowed by housing and capital gains tax changes, and even if in Toronto despite the mayor’s prioritization it receives less attention than our ongoing parking and tax grievances.
But it’s a possible bit of real good news in an affordability crisis, a measure that could directly and daily enrich the lives of children across the city. The mayor has personal reasons to celebrate. Looking back at my childhood classmates, I have a reason to understand why we should all join her.