Senate Budget and Fiscal Review Subcommittee No. 1 on Education

Budget Subcommitee number one on education will come to order. And as a first order of business, I am going to ask for a call of the roll.

[Roll Call]

Okay, we have established a quorum. This is the 6th hearing of the education budget Subcommitee, and there's four discussion items on the agenda. We will hear each item in turn, and we will take any public comment after the fourth item.

And as usual, I will assess how many people are here for public comment and then to, if there's a length of the time for people making public comment, and I would just say at the beginning, as I'm going to say at the end, if you have an interest in any of the items and you cannot testify today, you're watching remotely, or you won't be here at the right time, we can take comments by going to the Budget Committee website or by writing the Budget Committee at the address that's on the website, and we would appreciate any comments.

As I mentioned, this is a six hearing. We are not making decisions yet on individual items, but we will, by the time the revised budget comes out in May, we'll have aired every major education budget item for both k 12 in higher education and tried to send signals or General directions on items that we don't think have been worked out yet or need work. And that brings us to our four items today. And the first item is federal Fund status.

And the panel and I invite them to come up will be Melissa Ng from the Department of Finance, Dan Merwin from the Department of Education, and Michael Alferis from the Legislative Analyst Office. And while they are coming up and being seated, I would just say that federal funds for education across the country, and particularly to California, were very important during the pandemic. They really began during the pandemic, and now they are running out. And so the question is, in what manner is that happening?

What's the impact on school budgets? And as I move through my own legislative district and go to schools and meet with individual teachers, principals and superintendents, they talk to me about the impact of the federal funding. And so that is what our discussion will be about today. And we'll go in the order that I introduce people. We'll start with the Department of Finance. We'll go to the Department of Education, and then we'll go to the Legislative Analyst's office. So welcome to the Committee. It will be turned up here.

Good morning, chair. I'm listening with the Department of Finance. I don't have any prepared remarks related to this informational item, but I'm available for any questions.

Okay, then we'll go to the Department of Education.

Good morning, chair and Members of the Committee, I am Dan Merwin, administrator for CDE's fiscal policy office in the government affairs division, and I'm joined by. Closer to fair enough, we're here on behalf of the State Superintendent of Public Instruction. As noted in the agenda, the Federal Government passed three major pieces of legislation that provide TK education with funding to prevent, for, and respond to the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, the state has also made several appropriations to support the response efforts of our schools, including to support in person learning during the height of the pandemic, provide expanded learning opportunities, mitigate learning loss, and promote learning recovery.

Collectively, leas have received approximately 41.5 billion in stimulus funding since early 2020. Much of this funding has been made available retroactively for expenses back to March 2020 and has expired in waves. Thus far, 13.8 billion has expired, encompassing the Coronavirus relief Fund and the the Emergency and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund. Sorry, elementary and secondary school Emergency Relief Fund, or, if the chair will permit ESSER funds 1 and 2. There is also the governor's Emergency Education Relief Fund, known as Gear Fund 1 and 2.

No, you define the acronym the first time. That's at least the rules. Okay, good, good work.

ESSER a little bit cumbersome.

Not just your colleague had a start at the previous hearing, but he got there.

There's a similar acronym that will also come up. So leas have expended 99.69% of these funds collectively, the latest of which needed to be obligated by September 30, 2023 and liquidated by January 28 of this year. The next round of funding to expire, which includes all funds from the American Rescue Plan passed in March 2021, totals 19.7 billion. For federal funds, all funds must be obligated by September 30 of this year and liquidated by January 28 of next year, with very limited exceptions.

The largest pots of funding within this group are the ESSER three funds, which account for 13.5 billion, and the 5.7 that remains from the in person Instruction grant and the Expanded Learning Opportunities grant, which is not to be confused with the ongoing Fund made available from the Expanded Learning Opportunities program, which is what you heard a few weeks ago. Based on the latest quarterly reporting, which actually just closed last Friday.

The 12th 72% of all ESSER three funds and 75% of the remaining federal funds that make up the expanded learning opportunities grant are already expended. Importantly, these numbers only represent fully expended funds and do not take into account obligated amounts. We would also note that leas have planned how they will use these funds over the life of the programs, particularly for the Esser three funding that included a robust stakeholder process that was required by federal law.

Leas have provided no indication they will be unable to use the remaining funds, though we do anticipate that some of the larger projects undertaken by leas with these last rounds of funding, such as HVAC replacements or facility upgrades, are more likely to experience delays due to issues such as supply chain interruptions and thus more likely to sig the extended late liquidation approval.

As noted in the agenda, late liquidation provides leas with a total of 18 months to liquidate valid obligations rather than the standard 120 days, but these still have to be for funds that were properly obligated by September 30. As for what les are using this funding for, we've analyzed expenditure data and there are clear trends that really reflect different stages of the pandemic. The most common expenditure during the onset of the pandemic, bar none, was educational technology devices.

Connectivity also very high on the list, personal protective equipment and cleaning supplies. And just for a point of comparison, educational technology was 21 point billion, 2.1 billion of the first 6.8 billion that was available to LEAS. So, pretty significant collectively, this makes it clear to us that leas initially spent their funding on responding to immediate health and safety needs, as well as supporting the transition to distance learning.

As we shifted from pandemic response to pandemic recovery, LEAS spending and efforts to promote learning acceleration became the major focus to the point that today, if you look at ESSER expenditures across all iterations of that funding, you'll see that leas actually spent more funding on learning acceleration than they did on education technology. And that doesn't take into account funds or programs that have as their core requirements.

That funds are used for learning acceleration, which includes the 4.5 billion from the Expanded Learning Opportunities grant or 2.7 billion that had to be set aside from an LEAs ESSER three funding specifically for learning recovery. We've also seen leas spending on student mental health services and social emotional learning, as well as facility repairs that reduce virus transmission or support mental and emotional health.

Looking specifically at the Expanded Learning Opportunities grant, we have seen leas use these funds primarily to support accelerating progress, to close learning gaps, to provide additional academic services, and to support integrated to provide integrated pupil support. This includes activities such as tutoring or small group instruction, diagnostic progress monitoring and benchmark assessments, and health counseling and mental health services.

We've also seen leas braiding their funding to build longer term programs that respond to the entirety of the needs created by the pandemic, not just the immediate needs to protect health and safety and support distance learning, but to fully support not just learning recovery, but learning acceleration. And this is through services such as tutoring, expanded learning settings, and mental health and counseling services.

While the federal funding will expire this year, significant investments made by the Legislature will be available for the next three to four years, such as the Learning Recovery emergency Block grant or those initiatives that the Legislature now has the opportunity to continue through action in this budget, such as the homeless educational technical assistance centers that address the needs of our homeless student population and will be covered in the next issue.

These represent the next steps in the critical path to full recovery by building on what has worked and allowing additional time to further integrate the most promising practices into regular school budgets. Thank you. And we're happy to take questions at the appropriate time.

Great. We'll do that. Thank you for being here. Yes. To the LAO

Good morning, Mister chair. Michael Alferes with the Legislative Analyst Office. We don't have any specific comments, but are available to answer any questions.

Thank you. I sort of have two questions of this and one is to follow up on what you said said and it's in our agenda. It's sort of the anticipation of the local agencies and what they will apply for in liquidation extension requests. Do you have any flavor for what that's going to be?

Yes, and also, unfortunately no. We have what the current expenses are.

You're clearly ready for elected office.

We do have a very clear understanding of where expenditures stand today. What we don't have a clear understanding is obligations. We will have that as we get closer to the deadline period. We start collecting that with what we call fall 2024 reporting at the end of September. We do projections, they are pretty rough that do show some amount hanging out there that changes depending on the length of a liquidation deadline.

If you have a standard liquidation deadline, you would potentially have more funds, unexpended, longer liquidation deadline. You can have those larger projects that are having contractor delays, which is a common one that we had with s or two funding or being unable to get, say, the hvac equipment that you purchased. It just didn't get delivered in time because it was getting shipped from wherever.

We did have a total of 30 applications for the ESSER two gear, two funding and that was for $6.7 billion in funding at a much earlier point in the pandemic we're now looking at.

Maybe this leads to my second question, which I think everybody might want to weigh into, which is I'm trying to understand with the federal funds receding and school districts, local education agencies depending on them as the federal funds slip away, where was their new obligations paid for there? That sort of stress the districts going forward without having federal funds in the mix. I mean, what is the net result?

We have heard sort of the things that were done with the federal funds, but as they pull back, it's sort of, a lot of school districts are telling me that they're really in trouble in some ways because that's pulled back. How do you assess from the higher level, the federal money not being there? And I'll start with you because you're looking like you're ready to talk, but then I'll ask finance and the Legislative Analyst if they wish to weigh in.

I think one thing that we can do is we look at, when we look at the expenditure data, there's categories that are clearly a one time use. A facility improvement is not going to require an annual budget commitment other than, say, routine maintenance. But if you're doing a tutoring program and that's proven to be successful and that is something that you want to keep on going because maybe your test scores are improving or you're getting higher attendance from an expanded learning opportunities program.

Not to be confused with the actual program, but that type of program. Those would be the kinds of things that as a school administrator, I would want to continue. I would say, well, can I move this funding for the next few years into my learning recovery emergency block grant or other funding? Is there hopefully enough growth and out years in LCFF that I can continue these programs?

Because it's the staffing costs that are going to take a long time, maybe the contracts associated with it if you contracted something out. But those, those would be the types of programs that I think put the pressure on district budgets.

Okay, anything to add from the Department of Finance?

I don't have anything to add to the department's response. I think these funds were, I mean, I think everyone was aware that these funds are one time. So I think the Department has been providing guidance on kind of the uses of the funds for one time purposes and not to dedicate them to, to ongoing purposes for this very reason that it will eventually drop off at some point.

I appreciate that, but not everybody is as rational as your statement. Just indicated legislative analysis.

Thank you Mister chair. I'm not sure we have any specific comments, but I just wanted to reiterate to Mister Merwin's comments earlier. There is several state funding sources like the arts, music industry, discretionary materials block grant and the learning Recovery emergency block grant that could be used for some similar purposes to support students that have higher needs.

Okay. Thank you for that comment. I think the most important thing was just to highlight this because it is out there and it is something that people are reacting to. So I really appreciate your comments and being here for this panel. We'll see if anybody has public comment. Do you have a last comment?

Yes. Just one thing to consider though. The funding expires, a lot of the requirements around this don't for several years the annual reporting which some of your leas may have reached out to your office and complained why CD requiring 154 hours of reporting?

It's a federal requirement and it's my job just then to immediately refer them to you.

Yes, yes and yes it is. And then we refer them to their US congressman. So that's how that goes because it.

Is a for elected office. Yeah, okay. But I appreciate that because I have heard about that and I think that will be a question that many people have as it moves on. So thank you for being here for this and for participating in the discussion. And I know two of you are remaining for the next panel. It's the homeless education technical assistance centers. It'll be Melissa Ng again from the Department of Finance. It'll be William Mcgee from the Department of Education.

And again, it'll be Michael Alferes from the Legislative Analyst's office. And in opening comments, we'll go in that order. So welcome back to the Committee.

with the Department of Finance. So I'll be providing an overview of the homeless education technical assistance centers proposal or he tax included in the Governor's Budget. The Governor's Budget includes 1.5 million ongoing Proposition 98 General Fund to maintain support for the homeless education technical assistance centers that were first established through the American Rescue Plan act, homeless children and youth funds which are available through June 30, 2024.

This funding will continue the momentum in increasing homeless youth identification and providing supports to schools serving these students to improve their academic outcomes.

While existing statutes specifies the responsibilities of the HeATACs proposed in trailer Bill tends to include additional priorities to provide he tax a more proactive role in supporting leas, which include specifically providing technical assistance in implementing best practices in addition to developing and disseminating best practices, fostering relationships between community partners and leas in each region, including providing professional professional development and coaching opportunities to help build capacity locally providing targeted technical assistance to leas identified for differentiated assistance for their homeless student group, which includes helping leas optimize existing funding streams such as LCFF and the supplemental and concentration grant funding generated by these students, especially if there are spending gaps between these students and other high need student groups and finally, working collaboratively with leas to utilize available data through the California school dashboard or other local data sources to identify achievement gaps and how to implement best practices to help improve academic outcomes. That concludes my remarks and I'm happy to answer any questions at the appropriate time.

Thank you very much. Move to the Department of Education. Welcome back to the Committee.

Thank you and thank you for having me here. My name is William McGee. I'm the division Director for the student Achievement and support Division at the California Department of Education on behalf of the state Superintendent Tony Thurman, we appreciate the opportunity to speak about the work that the homeless education technical assistance centers have done and supported with and the work that they need to continue to do.

And so now that I've heard, as long as we clarify, I can start using acronyms because that is a lot to say. The he tax are also the he tax were established through a competitive grant process.

Three County Office of Education were selected to provide support and technical assistance to other county offices of education in a regional approach and to assist with capacity building resources and tools required to support their leas with the implementation of the Education for Homeless Children and Youth act, also known as EHCy act, using American Rescue Plan. Homeless children and youth, also referred to as Arp HCY funds from 21, excuse me, 2021 to 2024. Each he tax receive $1.5 million each year for the three year investment.

The he tax are also responsible for providing statewide technical assistance and professional development, such as hosting a statewide homeless education conference, monthly, webinars to provide technical assistance, and maintaining the HeTac center website where resources are housed. One of the top priorities for the HETACs is to always ensure that their work and the work of the county offices is supported by data.

The HETACs work with our various data systems at the California Department of Education to support that work, and the he tax have developed, presented, recorded and posted webinars and tip sheets that correspond to the needs of coes across the state, including proper identification, immediate enrollment, supporting children and youth who are homeless and eligible for special education, early education, and homeless students who identify as Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and questioning the work and activities at the he tax have accomplished in the past two years ensure significant support for California's most vulnerable children.

For the past two years, as I mentioned, the HeaTacs have done a variety of webinars. They have tracked the number of attendees and YouTube views for the webinars. Webinar attendance, depending on the topic has ranged from 53 attendees to over 341 attendees and YouTube views have ranged from 70 views to 154 depending on the webinar.

The most well attended and received trainings have been for school counselors in supporting transportation rights for children and youth, which have supported with increasing attendance, fulfilling graduation requirements, and an overall increase in school participation. Since their inception in November of 2021, each regional heatac has led provided customized support to their coes. These tasks include conducting regional needs assessment, program evaluation, and conducting regional meetings. So I wanted to take a moment to give a little bit of history about the he tax, the work that they've done.

As we know that the funding will inspire expire, it would be beneficial for the state to ensure ongoing funds to support the crucial work of the heat tax and supporting the leas that have benefited for this, this work. Thank you for allowing me to speak about the effective work the he tax have done and I'll be able to answer questions at the appropriate time.

Thank you very much and we'll move on to the Legislative Analyst.

Thank you Mister chair Michael Alferes with the LAO. We don't have specific recommendations on the merits of the proposal, but we just reiterate our comments in earlier hearings about the tightness of the state budget. The state budget can currently not support existing k 14 programs, so any new spending as well, extensions of existing spending, adds to the challenge of balancing the budget. That concludes our comments. Happy to answer any questions.

I appreciate your comments. I thought I'd make a brief comment and then sort of ask a question, and that is, I tried to get out in my own Senate district and a few weeks ago I visited a high school in Marina in Monterey County that had just this impressive program and they were covering some, some of it by themselves. And the County Office of Education has a person that's assigned to 26 school districts and was really helping them.

And I visited where they have showers, washing machines, quiet rooms. On Friday, they pack various backpacks with non perishable food and allow the students to take it to wherever they're going and just bring back the packs when they're empty sometime at the beginning of next week. And I was surprised at sort of the number of people that were in the category that they had to utilize that.

And there was just this whole mix of funding, and it looked like the federal funding wasn't some of it was Stuart Mckinney act, and it didn't look like it was necessarily going to continue. You witness what the Lao representative just said. They're hoping for some extra money, which seems just difficult in the current circumstances to be able to cover everything they're doing, and that there's other money that just sort of floats in and floats out and there's no sort of assurance.

And so I guess there's some questions that were in the agenda, but I think one is, to me, this was an effective practice. This is where they, on their own, assessed what was needed and figured out the best, best ways. They coordinated with the food bank. That's why they had a food pantry and had the other stuff. They really, and there were times when there was neglect or abuse that was sort of determined in this process.

And so I guess maybe to start with the Department of Education, how do you look around the state and see best practices at what people are doing and reflect them to other school districts or other people that might be experiencing it and might not have had the ability to respond this way?

Yeah, no, and that's a great question. And it sounds like your visit was also powerful. I know that San Francisco has done some things similar where they've worked with their county and the city and the community, and they allow for children and their families to sleep in the school and they have the shower system set up. And so going to your question about how do we reflect on best practices? That's part of what the he tax support does.

And then at the statewide homeless conference, we bring the leas together to talk about those type of things and to learn about those things. And then that's also shared across the various counties. And so the heat sack support with that regional approach, as you mentioned. So then that way the community can see what is needed and then they can bolster that. And then, of course, the homeless innovative programs toolkit is something that we also support.

I know that my team has done a very effective job at UC Berkeley, where we've hosted some meetings. And then the homeless innovation programs have been able to showcase the work they're doing and gives ideas to the other leas.

And then with the federal money that's related to homeless children and youth, is that going to be able to be obligated and expended so that it's all used within the timeframes and money with this incredible need doesn't go back.

Yes. If I'm understanding your question correctly, the Leas have the monies. And so what our team does is we know the monies that they've expended and so the monies that are remaining are obligated and they are going to be expended.

Okay. And then overall, and it's similar to the previous item, overall, it's this mix of funding sources, different pots from the feds, whether or not this state does some, whether or not people, districts dip into their own General funds. Is there any guidance or pressure from the state on how to mix these all together and make sure that the issues are addressed?

I wouldn't say pressure, I would say guidance. Like we'll provide technical assistance on how to do that, braiding funds and things of that nature. My team does a lot of technical assistance and webinars and then working with the he tax, really trying to support school districts on how to expend those funds so that they can get the best use of those monies.

And is there any added comment on those questions from either the Department of Finance or the Legislative Analyst?

Sure. Melissa Ng with the Department of Finance. So that is kind of the purpose of the trailer Bill Language that we're proposing as part of Governor's Budget that we are having. The he tax may take a more proactive role in looking at existing funding streams so they can help leas kind of, you know, braid these different Fund sources together. You know, especially with LCFF, you know, these students are generating, you know, possibly supplemental and concentration funding.

And we want to make sure that this funding is being used towards those students and the unique challenges that they face.

Okay. Anything from the legislative analysts? No, Mister chair. Thank you. I know, Senator Wilk, you didn't hear just the very first part of this, but I wondered if you had any questions. Okay, I know you're good, but I wondered if you had questions. Yeah. Okay. Well, thank you. Well then this, I appreciate the admonition, but I appreciate all the work that's being done.

And I think, think as we move toward the revised budget in May and tying it down, we'll really hope there's some way to address these needs because it is really powerful over the fact that this exists as an issue. As I say, you don't. We'll have community colleges next week. And I was a community college trustee and I haven't been on the board in 22 years, and I never heard about an unsheltered community college person. It was the community. People had their homes.

They were coming out of the community. And now I ask, and I get the answer, that between one and 4% of the student body is unsheltered. And then there's a distinct layer above that where there's housing and security. And so I think it's really dramatic in k through 12. And I just hope that in the midst of all the fiscal pressures we can figure out how to continue to address that. So thank you for being here today. We appreciate that.

This very much. And we're going to move on to what I think is probably the item that will have the most participation issue three, nutrition. And we will still continue with Melissa Ng from the Department of Finance, Kim Frinzel from the Department of Education, and then Sarah Cortese from the Legislative Analysts Office. And I know we have, have the Legislative Analyst report from February that had a report on this.

And so let me just make a brief comment heading into this, and that is that I think the Legislature in the last few years has really been committed to universal school meals. And there are certain things about this that are counter counterintuitive because it's always tempting to squeeze every last dollar out of everywhere, which actually is the subject of this hearing.

But when you have universal, one thing we found in places that have done this is that it removes the stigma there was always for kids that had free and reduced meals a lot of times that was called out in places that there was a sort of stigma or uncomfortability about it. And when there's sort of a universal to it, that in some places has started to fall away. So that is really significant.

And then the complexity is that we have these overlapping federal funding sources that might not help lead to cost control in how it's done and might have some different requirements. And so we're trying to figure out how to be universal, how to maximize every dollar, how to control costs, how to remove the stigma. And as you'll see in the lengthy staff report, those things seem to be in conflict.

And so I think that's the nature of our discussion, is understand what's happening, sort of how we're going against what the Legislature and the Governor have wanted and where, in a time of fiscal difficulties, do we go with those goals. So that is sort of normally, that was a speech I would have given at the end. I heard you all the talk of, but I thought it would set the table for this. And so we'll go in the order that I mentioned, people, and start with the Department of Finance.

Thank you. Melissa Ng with the Department of Finance. I'll provide an overview of the Governor's Budget proposal related to child nutrition. The Governor's Budget includes a one time backfill of 65 million Proposition 98 General Fund in the current year to cover an anticipated shortfall based on new projections and actual meal counts through August 2023. Part of this shortfall is attributed to current year funding being used to cover past year meal reimbursement.

Finance provided authority for the Department of Education to utilize up to 14 million in current year funds to cover past year meal reimbursement claims. As of Governor's Budget, the Department had used 12 million of the authorized 14 million. The shortfall in the past year was due to 22 actuals coming in approximately 17.7 million meals higher than may revise estimates, representing about 1.4% higher lunch meal counts and 3.6% higher breakfast meal counts than originally projected for budget year.

The Governor's Budget also includes an increase of 122.2 million Proposition 98 General Fund to fully Fund the anticipated growth in universal meals in 2014 based on serving a projected 848 million meals and including the estimated increase in federal reimbursement rates, which results in changes to the state portion of the reduced price and paid meal categories.

This estimate assumes 1% increase in lunch meal counts and 3% increase in breakfast meal counts for an increase of 17 million additional meals or overall 2% increase to the universal meals program over the 22-23 meal counts. We assume there will be a continued growth in the short term before leveling off with anticipated growth drivers including the continued ramp up of breakfast programs since prior to universal meals mandate not all schools offered breakfast.

Also increasing awareness of universal meals in General and then also the increasing quality and variety of meal offerings due to recent investments in both the kitchen infrastructure and freshly prepared meals. The Governor's Budget includes an increase of 13.447 million Proposition 98 General Fund to reflect a 0.76% cost of living adjustment, bringing the state reimbursement rate from 0.968.

This would bring the total increase for the nutrition program to 135.677 million for both growth and cost of living adjustment in the budget year for a total of 1.783 billion for this program. That concludes my remarks and I'm happy to answer any questions at the appropriate time.

Thank you very much. Then we'll go to the Department of Education. Welcome to the Committee.

Thank you. Good morning Mister chair and Committee Members Kim Frinzell with the Department of Education on behalf of State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond and I appreciate a.

Little closer to there you go.

All it right. There you go. I appreciate your opening remarks and it certainly food is very complicated and meals and access is incredibly complicated, but reducing stigma is incredibly important for our 5.8 million public school students. So I'm going to talk mainly about the why and then I also will address some of what we are doing to help ensure that we are trying to maximize as much of the federal meal reimbursement as possible for the State of California.

So universal meals is absolutely sound educational and public health policy for our public school students, and it offers greater access and equity to healthy meals during the school day. And we have research that confirms that from across the nation on the value and the efficacy of Universal Meals program. A strong universal meals program supports the social emotional well being, reduces the stigma, reduces meal debt for our school districts, and improves the overall health for all students.

School meals is an essential component of the whole child approach, quality education, transforming our California schools and improving academic achievement. And we know and we heard in the last panel, far too many students do not have consistent access to adequate nutrition or able to meet their basic food needs. And a school meals program are many times the healthiest meals that far too many of our students are receiving, based on a third party analysis sponsored by no Kid Hungary.

On average, students across all economic levels who are eating school breakfast achieve 17.5% higher scores on standardized math tests and attend one and a half more days of school during the school year. A fully funded California Universal meals program is foundational, so all students have the ability to partake in a school breakfast and a school lunch with dignity and no shaming, regardless of their income.

And I want to stress this is incredibly important in the State of California due to our high cost of living compared to the rest of the nation. Because the federal meal programs, the income thresholds are consistent across all 48 states and territories, with the exception of Alaska and Hawaii, there is no regional indexing. When the Federal Government sets the federal poverty levels that make a child either income eligible for the paid rate, the reduced price rate, or the free rate.

And to kind of put this in perspective, they just released the income guidelines for the upcoming school year. So to illustrate this, if a family of three makes over $47,767 annually, that's just $919 weekly for that family of three. Regardless if they live in California, California, or in Iowa, they would not be income eligible for free or reduced price meals. They would be considered paid. And if we did not have California universal meals, they would need to pay for their students meals.

The California Budget of Policy center released a report, and based on 2022 data, 44% of the food insecure families in California had incomes above the federal poverty level that would make their child qualify for a reduced price meal. Food insecurity crosses all three income eligibility categories for our meal programs. Our families depend on California universal meals as part of their child's education, and our participation numbers reflect that. And you heard the investments that we're making and the increase in participation prior to the pandemic.

In 2018, our schools served over 822 million school meals. In the 2223 year, schools served more than 845 breakfast and lunch. And for this federal, for this fiscal year 2223 we are projecting that about 894 million school meals will be served. But central to being able to provide these meals is that we have predictable, reliable and full state meal reimbursement for our schools.

That is so there's no proration, and that we have the ability to augment the authority for additional funds if needed so schools can have confidence that they're able to provide these meals. Not fully funding schools for universal meals is, is detrimental to their financial viability of not just their cafeteria Fund, but also their district's General Fund, which is really, truly needed for other things like classroom services and educational services and resources.

The intent of the state mill reimbursement is to ensure that local educational agencies are financially able to serve healthier, more freshly prepared, culturally relevant meals that meet the federal meal standards. And unfortunately, we know that our school districts and their food service departments have always operated on extremely tight budgets. And this is just exasperated recently with inflation, with higher food cost staffing rates, and also, as well as staffing vacancies. These continue to really be strong pressure points for our meal programs.

In a recent national survey by the School Nutrition Association reported that serious to moderate concerns regarding the financial stability of school nutrition programs is very, very prevalent. And this concern was most concentrated in the western states. And we know this is true for California as well, because 28% of our public schools and 42% of the charter schools that are operating the national lunch school breakfast program are encroaching on their districts General Fund to support their meal operations.

And this will continue to be problematic as many of the very generous and wonderful state one time grants, such as the kitchen infrastructure and training funds and the local school foods best practices. As those start to sunset, we're going to see more of the encroachment by our school food service departments. If for any reason universal meals is prorated or reduced. Sustaining universal meals and the state funding is critical, as is good stewardship and solid policy, we do recognize that.

So there's not one singular I am wrapping up. There's not one singular solution to maximizing the federal reimbursements. It will continue to take several strategies, but starting in the new school year, the Department of Education will be implementing a new enhanced direct certification matching process to allow for more probabilistic matching or fuzzy matching so that we can make sure that we have, we're identifying more children that are categorically eligible for the programs.

This strategy, along with really continuing to work with our schools on their local direct certification match through the local county social services office, again will help increase those students that are being identified as categorically eligible and will help us to better maximize the federal reimbursement. We are continuing our longstanding practice of strong technical assistance, training, resources, communications, sharing of best practices and around direct certification, and how best to maximize community eligibility and other federal provisions. And likewise, there's some policy decisions that we collectively can make.

Under the federal rule, direct certification, there's only a three time a year requirement to do their match. We strongly encourage schools to do that on a monthly basis. That could be a requirement that we consider. So finally, I also don't want to lose sight of the importance of ensuring that students have adequate time to eat their healthy school meals. We want to make sure that that's in the forefront as well.

So, in closing, as the first state in the nation to implement universal meals, we have taken bold steps to establish greater equity in our school meal programs that benefit all students, and the Department of Education could not have done it alone. We have so many strong partners and community advocates out there helping us to be very good thought partners and to be good stewards in protecting this program.

So together, we are investing in every student so that they all are better equipped to reach their full academic potential through consistent, nutritious meals each school day. Thank you. That concludes my very long testimony, and I'm happy to answer questions at the appropriate time.

Thank you very much. Then we'll move to the Legislative Analyst.

Good morning. Sarah Cortez LAO given the budget condition and the cost pressures within the school nutrition program, our school nutrition analysis provides options to contain future cost growth.

And I want to emphasize that this is a menu of options that the Legislature can choose from if it decides this is an an area that costs need to be contained because of projected growth in the nutrition program and available funding, none of these options we provide in our analysis would change the requirement for public schools to offer free meals to all their students. So in our view, this maintains universal meals.

Now, before I walk through the different options, I want to spend a few minutes discussing how the state rates have changed for school nutrition programs because of two actions. One was implementing universal mills and the other was providing a discretionary rate increase. The sergeant provided you with our Proposition 98 report that looks like this. In this report, there's a green tab that turns you to page 24 of our analysis. Figure 11 is the figure I want to walk through because it shows how rates work.

Under universal mills, all the bars are the same height, so a school receives the same amount per mill regardless if it's served to a student eligible for free, reduced or paid. You can see that the free a free meal, the bulk of the funds that make up the rate that make up the rate the school receives are federal funds with a small share of state funds where a paid meal that's flipped.

The bulk of the funds that a mill for the mill is state funds with the small share federal funds. Prior to Universal mill, the state provided a flat rate of that was only provided for free and reduced mills. Paid meals did not receive any state funds. So figure 12 of a of our report shows the historical rate going back to 2018 to 19. In 22-23 there was a significant discretionary rate increase of mil that was provided.

So that's why you see in 22-23 on figure 12 that those brown bars jump up quite a bit. And then you see this new blue bar reflecting that the state for the first time provided funds for paid mills in accordance to the newly established reimbursement system under universal school mills. So now with that background, I'll walk through the three options we put forth in our analysis. The first option is to set the nutrition rate lower. There are two ways to reduce the rate.

The first is across the board reduction. Going back to our figure 11, this keeps all the bars the same height. It's just lowering them all with the state amount. Or another option is taking a targeted approach such as reducing the paid contribution. As you can see in this figure, the paid bar requires the most state funds. So that. So that would be another option there. The paid bar would be lower, the free and reduced parts would remain the same height.

The second option we lay out is revisiting the approach to COLA. So looking back at our figure 11, let's just look at the free bar for a second. The dark piece of the bar is grown annually by the state k 12 COLA. Governor's Budget assumes a 0.76% and the till bar is grown by the federal COLA set by the Federal Government that will be provided with federal funds. Governor's Budget assumes a 5.5% increase. Under the Governor's Budget.

The combined state and state and federal contribution grows 4.7%. So that's the increase that schools would receive, which is much higher than the 0.76% assumed in the Governor's Budget. For the rest of k 12 programs. The growth in the federal COLA results in the state contribution to the paid rate beyond the 0.76% state COLA as well.

The state share of the paid rate is assumed to grow 6.6% under Governor's Budget because the Federal Government provides because the increase the Federal Government provides to the free rate and how our reimbursement system is structured so the state approach for the COLA the state could approach the COLA differently for school nutrition, the first approach is to no longer provide a federal COLA to the paid rate, and this would mean the combined free and paid rate would no longer grow at the same pace.

The second approach is to suspend the automatic COLA adjustment and just decide on the inflationary adjustment factor annually. The third option we lay out is suspend the administrative augmentation authority. In 2223 the budget included provisional language that requires Department of Finance to augment the appropriation for school nutrition if expenditures are projected to exceed the amount available.

If the Legislature suspended this language, it would return school nutrition funding to how it worked prior to 2223 where if there wasn't enough funding for school nutrition provided in the annual budget, the Legislature could either provide an additional additional augmentation or prorate the state meal rate. Suspending this language allows the Legislature to consider increases in school nutrition along with other priorities within k 12 education and the last thing I'll discuss is our only recommendation.

All of everything that I talked about was options you have before you and this recommendation is aligned with toward an eye of long term program structure and it's about the mandatory participation requirement for CEP schools. So there's newly eligible CEP schools starting in 2425 given a federal rule change.

With the federal change, the Federal Government implemented, and the state requires that if you're eligible for CEP, you must opt into what we refer to in our report as alternative reimbursement options or what betterly referred to as the provisions. So figure 10 of our analysis on page 2023 of your report provides a side by side of how school nutrition reimbursement traditionally works and how it works under CEP.

One of the key reasons for the mandatory participation requirement, the state mandatory participation requirement, I should say, is to maximize federal reimbursements. And based on our modeling, CEP participation for newly eligible schools doesn't always maximize federal reimbursement. Among the newly eligible group, about half of them would, and then half of them. Half of them would receive greater federal reimbursement, and then half of them would receive lower federal reimbursement, meaning the state would have to make up that difference under our reimbursement structure.

An example that we highlight in a report is a school that received a free, that received the free and reduced price rate for two thirds of its lunches, but it had a pretty Low isp of 29%. It wasn't eligible for CEP in 22-23 but it would be required to participate in 24-25.

So under CEP, if it would have been eligible, less than half of its lunches would have been reimbursed at the free and reduced price mill where it used to receive two thirds of its lunches, resulting in increased state costs. And that concludes my remarks. Thank you.

Thank you very much. I was going to give Senator Wilk a first havat, but while your comments are fresh in our mind, let me ask a follow up before checking with him. And that is you have options that you just mentioned for trying to preserve the provision of universal meals but be able to cut costs in certain ways.

Do those options rely on school districts having to put money in that they don't put in because we're sort of capping state and federal by what we're doing and still requiring the universal or the. I'm just trying to understand because I have a feeling there's somebody that pays the piper for that. And I'm trying to understand of whether it's in some reduced service or somebody else paying costs. How in your options would that fit?

Yeah, so this, so it, I can't think. It depends on what option we're talking about. So the first one we laid out is just paying a lower per mil price for each meal that we serve. So that could have the effect in different ways in how nutrition departments at school districts kind of respond to that. The other option is just changing the way it grows on an annual basis. That was the second option. So that's going to have impacts in the future.

This idea that we're kind of matching the federal rate certainly doesn't align with kind of growth in other areas that K 12, other K 12 programs are about to see. And then the recommendation that we actually have is just looking at like what are we requiring that school districts do with the CEP participation? It's new that they're going to have to participate because of our state mandatory participation requirement. So that that's something that isn't in place yet, but we see as something looking into the future that could result in state costs.

Okay, thank you. Let me ask, I'm going to defer to you. Okay. And then come back to me if I have a follow up to one of your questions. I appreciate that. I was going to ask a couple of the questions that are in the agenda packet. But first, just in a more global way, how can we try to stick to our commitment for universal meals and maximize federal funding?

And I know you mentioned that, but just sort of drawing it out with all three of you, are there specific steps that we can take as part of the budget process to do that? The finance person looks mildly perplexed.

Melissa Ng with Department of Finance. So I don't think there's like an easy answer. You know, I think we can try to have provide more guidance to school to try to collect as many more applications as we can. So we are maximizing our federal drawdown. I think we heard from my colleague at Department of Education how they're trying to utilize fuzzy match for direct certification so we can identify eligible students even if we don't receive applications.

But I think there's just a continued growth in meals and I think, you know, students need these meals and that's why we're seeing this growth. You know, Lao has laid out some of the options that we can take in order to kind of contain costs, but with the mandate, the funding that we don't provide from the state schools will end up having to take on that burden if they're already operating on tight budgets as it is.

Department of Education.

Kim Frinzell with the Department of Education. Yeah, I think there's a few options. Right. It's not going to be one silver lining that will solve it all. Certainly the fuzzy matching, I think will absolutely help. And so we're going to be able to identify more children that are eligible at the free rate. So the Federal Government will be picking up that price tag.

We could certainly consider, instead of encouraging schools under the federal law, again, around the monthly matching to pull down their student data to see what children are being directly certified, maybe the State of California could consider a monthly requirement to that.

So again, just so that we fresh data and continuing to looking to maximize those matches, I think we can certainly work with our counterparts at the local social services and health departments and the local match that's helping to help schools do better matches at the local level. We don't want just a state match or just a local match. We need to use all avenues so I think we can build stronger partnerships there.

I think there's certainly, and one of the options to consider is when we implemented universal meals at that time, the federal threshold for community eligibility was at the 40% identified student percentage that has now been reduced federally down to the 25%. At the time when we introduced policy for universal meals, requiring that the high poverty schools that met the current threshold for community eligibility, it was at that 40%. That's no longer necessarily maximizing federal dollars. So do we need to re examine that as well?

And then what I will just say is, as thankfully as we get further out from the pandemic, families and the education and moving away from no requirements for meal applications or data collection for the meal programs, we're going to be able to reeducate our families on the importance of universal meals and the data collection. And really to one of your points, how do we incentivize this?

It's really moving away from it's a meal application or meal data to its educational data for our families that we need. So whether it's for title one funding or Internet services, La Unified School District has a beautiful campaign and it's been quite successful in collecting their data. And it's more than a meal. So really just reframing that narrative with our schools and our communities. Thank you.

And anything you would add. Yeah, I know you've laid out options already.

Yeah, I just wanted to provide some additional data that adds a little wrinkle and nuance to this conversation. So within your agenda and in our report, there's figure 15 that shows that higher, there's a higher share of lunches that are served in the paid category. And I laid out how the nutrition reimbursements work, where the paid, the paid meals are the most expensive from the state's perspective.

But the other layer of information I want to provide over this is our FRPM eligibility rates at the statewide are actually quite steady. So in 2018 to students were eligible for free and reduced price mills and 222359.9%. So that we have these stable eligibility FRPM eligibility rates. But we are seeing this trend where there are more paid mills. So those things I would seeing this data at first glance, I go to the same thought perspective as I think some of you are getting.

Given the questions and the agenda of we need to make sure we're maintaining the eligibility or increasing the eligibility, but our rates of eligibility are stable. So that's just a layer of information to provide additional nuance to this conversation.

Okay. And I know that one of the questions was how to incentivize families to submit the federal meal eligibility forms. And I know we've talked around that, but anything on that that we haven't talked about that might be help in doing that.

And unfortunately, I would like to be clear if we're shifting the cost to somebody in how we're doing that in some ways because we're hearing a lot from school districts of the fraction of a percent, yes, it's closer to two thirds of a percent, but the percent that might be in the Local Control Funding Formula when people have contracts, inflations, and other things, and jamming additional costs in that are not covered now is going to just be very, very difficult in this year.

So--and yet we have presented you with just a wonderfully impossible situation. We just really want to keep the meals going and say, figure it out. But it's like, there's a reality in figuring it out. So I appreciate the fact that this has been aired in a good way, that we have heard the options, and I think we understand clearly what's before us. So thank you very much for participating today.

And we're going to move on to our last issue, Issue Four: Parks Access, and our panelists are Katie Lagomarsino from the Department of Finance, Elizabeth McGuirk from the Department of Parks and Recreation, and Michael Alferes, a return panelist from the Legislative Analyst's Office. And so we will go in that order of Finance, Parks, and Legislative Analyst. So welcome to the Committee.

Good morning. Good morning, Chair, Senator Wilk. Katie Lagomarsino with the Department of Finance. I'll provide an overview of our State Parks pass proposal. The Governor's Budget proposes 2.1 million ongoing Prop 98 General Fund for a County Office of Education to enable fourth graders attending public schools to access California State Parks.

The corresponding statutory language proposes that the selected County Office of Education contract with the California Department of Parks and Recreation and will not recover indirect costs on these funds. That concludes my remarks. I'm happy to take questions at the appropriate time.

Thank you, and then let me welcome back to the Legislature, Liz McGuirk from the Department of Parks and Recreation. Good to see you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair and Members. Liz McGuirk, Chief Deputy Director at the Department of Parks and Recreation. And as part of the Governor's Outdoors for All Initiative in 2021, the Department of Parks created the California State Adventure Pass. And this pass provides California fourth graders with free day use access to 54 state parks throughout California during the fourth grade school year, and we do that from September through the end of August.

The Adventure Pass is an important tool to assist California's efforts to increase access to our natural, cultural, and recreational resources. By integrating outdoor experiences into the fourth grade learning, we hope to inspire a deeper connection with nature and instill valuable lessons in environmental stewardship and California history. As of April 15th, over 57,000 Adventure Passes have been downloaded. For this current school year specifically, over 13,000 passes have been downloaded. The 2.1 million dollars requested includes funding for staff costs, operating equipment, and transportation grant programs.

And we believe that providing free day use access to California fourth graders will not only open doors to outdoor exploration, but also breaks down barriers that might otherwise hinder access to these invaluable resources. And with that, I thank you for your consideration, and I'm happy to take questions at the appropriate time.

Thank you very much. Then we'll go to the Legislative Analyst.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Similar to our comments on Issue Two, we don't have a specific recommendations on the merits of the proposal, but just reiterating the kind of the budget issue, the tightness of the state budget, and cost pressures that ongoing programs would kind of add, and whether, regardless of whether or not you approve this proposal, districts could use their local funds, such as LCFF, to support field trips and other activities to connect students with parks and outdoor spaces. With that, concludes my comments. Happy to answer any questions at the appropriate time.

Thank you very much. Before I go to my question, I just have to comment that I have this great family picture of me when I'm in about the fourth grade with my grandmother and my brother at Fort Ross. And who knew I would be shooting off a cannon with the Russian ambassador there a few decades later? But it created that kind of interest in that.

I think we have in the packet the numbers of how many students utilize this, roughly 17,000 in 2021, almost 26,000 in 2022, 5,000 in 2023. But it gives no characterization of who they are, and I wondered if anybody knew because it seems to matter to me if we're spending this money and it's kids from disadvantaged schools. That's incredible because they wouldn't get there. If it's kids from basic aid schools, then what the Legislative Analyst just said probably applies.

They probably have extra property tax money and they should be doing it. And I'm not proposing an absolute means testing, but I'm wondering if we have a sense of who is using this.

So we do know that--we do have statewide use. I would say that through the programs that we've offered for weekend and summer transportation trips, that the majority of those families are from underserved communities and Title 1 schools. We do have specific outreach that we do through Department of Education and County Offices of Education to Title 1 schools.

So we do know that these programs are impacting families that either haven't otherwise gone to parks, that didn't know about parks, so that we know that we are getting to families that face barriers to accessing parks.

And is this anecdotal from what you just said or is this actually clear through some collection of information?

Right. So the grant programs that we've done through our partner, Parks California, they have collected data and surveys from grant recipients and users of those programs. So we do have those.

Do you have that in a summary thing or do you have all the--

Yeah, we could send that over to the Committee. Yes.

So we could get a chance to see that. And you see, one of the interesting things is in a prior job I had where I actually worked with Ms. McGuirk, I moved up and down the state, and I never ceased to be amazed at kids in San Diego that lived six miles from the ocean but had never been to the ocean or kids that--the O'Neill family does outdoor education. People from San Jose had never been to the ocean.

And I found, I was surprised it was this unsolicited, recurring theme as I moved up and down the coast, and so, I get this. This is something that really makes a difference. I just want to know, I don't want to single out some really wealthy school district, but I want to know it's serving the kids I just mentioned, and not just that. So I will look forward to that information.

Yes. And then in addition to the grant program surveys, we do have surveys that go out to individual passholders' families, and we haven't had as much uptake on the completion of those surveys as we had hoped for. So through other partnerships with Park Partners, we're able to offer incentives for completion of surveys, and so we're hoping to have more data in the next month or so from that as well.

Well, that'd be great. That actually might be just in time.

Yes.

So thank you.

Thank you.

Any follow-up questions? Senator Wilk.

Actually, just a comment, because I was going to share the same thing. I was involved with a boys and girls club in Oxnard, which is on the beach, and we took a bunch of young people born and raised in Oxnard, have never been to the beach, and it's just like--so I think it's important to get that kind of exposure. So that's one.

Number two: I was in Sonoma County two weeks ago, and I drove up because of Waze--Fort Ross Road, that's like an escape route. Have you been on that road? Not even a road.

Yeah. I'm really aware of that road.

Well, Waze took me that way. Fortunately, I had rented a jeep, so it was okay, but it was quite an adventure. Got up to the top, took some photos, but I didn't post any of them because it did not do justice to the beauty of that area. But, yeah. Crazy.

No, it's--when I was at Resources, we named a new Parks Director in the middle of a week, and she reminded me that she was scheduled to get married that weekend, and it was the time that the Russian ambassador was visiting Fort Ross. So my wedding present was a seven-hour round trip on that road to let her go get married and let me blow off the cannon.

And then I'd like to see that data, too, when it comes again.

Right. And I think that those were really our comments, because in general, this is an excellent thing, and it provides some help to parks, which always could use help. It gets people there that never would be there otherwise.

I think we just want to make sure it's properly directed and the right people are benefiting by it. Any last comment? Then thank you very much. Sorry you had to wait all the way through for such a lengthy discussion. That completes the four issues that we were considering, but we want to offer an opportunity for people to make public comment to the Committee. So let me ask, who in the room is desirous of making a public comment? One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15.

Then let's do our best to limit it to a minute, but we want to hear from all 15 of you, so if you would move to this microphone and start with your name and any organization and give us the benefit of what your thoughts are on these items. Welcome to the Committee.

Thank you. Good morning. I'm Lucy Salcido Carter. I'm speaking on behalf of the Alameda County Office of Education. We, among other things, support our schools countywide in serving students experiencing homelessness. At any point in time, we have roughly 4,000 students experiencing homelessness in our county. We are in strong support of the 1.5 million dollar proposed allocation for the HETACs. We value the HETACs because their experts are available to answer questions in real time so that schools can help students and families in real time.

They provide vital information on how to identify students experiencing homelessness, refer them to services, and provide model programming. Our regional HETAC has helped us create a local network of support for our students. We also turned to the HETAC team for consultation on McKinney-Vento provisions to ensure that the rights of our students are met. For these reasons, we ask that you support the proposed 1.5 million dollars for the HETACs. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Appreciate your comments. Welcome.

Thank you. Hello, I'm Pixie Popplewell. I am the California Homeless Youth Project Director, and I'll be speaking on the HETAC centers through data and student experience. There are 1,800 liaisons designated to serve the 248,000 homeless students across the state. That is an average of 140 students per liaison, with heavier caseloads in regions like San Luis Obispo with 243, and Orange with 490 students per liaison. In comparison, the recommended caseload for social workers is 15 to 24.

For 97 percent of these liaisons, supporting homeless students is additional to being a principal or a superintendent. The consequences are felt by students. One student spoke on Impact: 'it's really hard to manage going to school in general and then dealing with being homeless at the same time. I didn't have any motivation to go to school anymore. It was just hard. I was couch surfing or had to stay with a family member that lived in a different city.' Another student spoke on awareness. 'It's so difficult to find those resources.'

'I had to talk to my counselor and tell her what was going on at home for her to tell me about a program. There was no poster. It's not advertised out there. Like, what if I didn't ask?' I hope that these statements provide a foundation for the speakers that follow. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Appreciate your comments. Welcome to the Committee.

Hi, Chair and Members. Itzúl Gutierrez from the California Association of Food Banks and on behalf of GRACE End Child Poverty. Thank you, Chair Laird, for lifting up School Meals for All and all it does, especially removing stigma. As we heard among California's families who are experiencing food insecurity, nearly half incomes are too high to meet the federal eligibility requirements for Free and Reduced Priced Meals.

So now more than ever, you know, School Meals for All is the most important change to education policy in decades, ensuring that all students have access to nutritious meals at school to support their learning and health. As mentioned earlier, there's no silver bullet for, you know--there's all kinds of different ways to maximize, and one I want to lift up is Summer EBT, the new federal program that's going to be an avenue to incentivize families to fill out a meal application or form.

So that's going to be a great pathway to do that. We're grateful to California leading the way and the nation for School Meals for All, and we ask for support for the Governor's proposal to fully fund School Meals for All. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Appreciate your comments. Welcome to the Committee.

Thank you. Good morning, Chair and Members. Kapri Walker, on behalf of No Kid Hungry and AltaMed. We urge the Legislature to maintain California's commitment to expanding access to nutritious school meals and summer meals and continue investing in the well-being of students. We have seen firsthand how important additional state funds are to school-based anti-hunger programs and understand that food insecurity is a public health issue. Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Good morning, Chair and Members. Alicia Rozum from the Placer County Office of Education, just up the 80. Last school year, our school districts identified over 2,000 students experiencing homelessness in our county, which is kind of surprising if you think about the demographics of Placer County.

These students and their families are living in tenuous, shared housing situations otherwise known as doubled up, or sleeping in their cars, or staying in shelters or paying exorbitant daily rates for motel rooms because they don't have the credit or a security deposit to afford an apartment. Most Placer County school districts and my County Office of Education receive very little funding to support the multiple, complex needs of these students and their families.

To that end, we greatly rely on the technical assistance, consultation, and coaching we receive from the HETACs. Their team provides responsive, informed, and robust guidance on complex homeless situations, helping me and my colleagues to provide the most trauma-informed, legally sound, and sensible support to these students and their families. If I didn't have HETAC at the ready with this critical support, my ability to guide school districts and directly support unhoused students would be nearly impossible. Please continue to fund HETACs. Thank you.

Thank you. Appreciate your comments. Welcome.

Hi. Good morning, Chair and Members. Liz Fenton for the Office of Kat Taylor and the School Meals for All Coalition. We represent over 150 groups in support of the Governor's January Proposal to fully fund the School Meals for All Program. Thank you, Senator Laird, Senator Wilk, for your leadership in passing the School Meals for All Program. For many of our students, this is the only meal that they will get all day.

We want to recognize the difficult choices you must make in the face of a massive budget shortfall, and we're working very closely with the department and budget staff to maximize federal reimbursements and encourage families to participate in the program. Thank you very much.

Thank you very much.

Good morning. My name is Kanitra Lopez, and--Chair and Members, my name is Kanitra Lopez, and I live in Roseville, California, in Placer County, actually. I'm an educator and I've served as a school administrator, and I have three children that range from preschool to middle-school age. I'm here today on behalf of Women's Foundation California and in partnership with the Coalition for School Meals for All.

And I'm here to really testify in support of fully funding School Meals for All. For many of the students in my children's school, the demographics of our neighborhood is changing. There's lots of students who've come from different places, and providing meals and allowing all students to engage in a meal together has been very supportive in the school culture and environment that my students have been a part of.

Also, funding this proposal essentially is very important for advancing racial equity and justice and ensuring Black, indigenous, and Latinx students receive access and nutrition to be able to be able to learn and be able to demonstrate their knowledge in school and further. So thank you for support and listening and for consideration in support of this, and I hope that we find some way--I know there's no magic bullet--but some way to continue this because it's been really helpful.

All the costs are adding up as inflation goes up, and so this is something that even those that don't qualify and it fluctuates can be able to count on for their students. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Welcome.

Good morning. Sarah Brennan with Weideman Group, here representing NextGen California. We respectfully request the Committee support the Governor's January Budget proposal to fully fund California School Meals for All Program. According to the California Budget and Policy Center, 44 percent of families facing food insecurity in California would not qualify for Free and Reduced Priced School Meals because the federal program's income requirements are too low for states where it's more expensive, like California. School Meals for All bridges that gap.

The program is working and serves as a model for other states on how to invest in school meals, on how investing in school meals reduces stigma and child hunger. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Welcome.

Good morning, Chair and Members. Abby Halperin with the Center for Ecoliteracy, in support of School Meals for All and maintaining full funding for School Meals as proposed in the Governor's January Budget. We work with a network of 120 school districts across California, and they have told us loud and clear School Meals for All is working. Thank you, Senator Laird, for your excellent questions and leadership on this issue.

I was going to talk about all the positive impacts that this program is happening from the single mother in San Luis Coastal who no longer has to worry about her child's next meal to the students in Tustin Unified who report that they aren't concerned with socioeconomic status. But instead, I want to respond directly to your questions around maximizing the federal reimbursement.

You did already a good job of naming the school districts where they're in the districts of Committee Members, so you've already scored one. Yeah.

Thank you, Senator. As CDE spoke about, there are solutions that they're prepared to roll out, like probabilistic matching, local matching, and more frequent matching that can help us better identify the students that are already eligible for our public benefit programs but aren't being captured in School Meals or in the current Free Reduced Price Meal counts.

At the same time, there's an opportunity to support schools in better communication to families with a communications toolkit in multiple languages that really addresses what Kim spoke about, about the broader benefits of the meal. So we're committed to working with you and everyone here on identifying those solutions and continuing to protect and preserve this important program without putting more of a burden back on the school districts. Thank you so much.

Thank you very much. Welcome.

Good morning. Thank you for your time today. My name is Susie Terry, and I'm the coordinator for homeless education services at the San Diego County Office of Education. I support all the LEA school district and charter school liaisons in San Diego County with professional development and technical assistance in support of the over 20,000 students identified as experiencing homelessness in San Diego County.

I also serve as one of the Homeless Education Technical Assistance Center, or HETAC leads, helping coordinate and facilitate the statewide technical assistance and support of county office and LEA liaisons. I'm in strong support of the 1.5 million allocation for the Homeless Education Technical Assistance Center. Prior to America Rescue Plan funds and once they expire, California's financial support of homeless education programs has been exclusive to the federal McKinney-Vento funds or Education for Homeless Children and Youth funds that are allocated to states.

Those funds are granted out to LEAs in sub-grants to support homeless students. While California is home to the largest number of students experiencing homelessness than any other state, a mere eight percent of local education agencies receive any of those funds. Eight percent. Due to the lack of dedicated funding, the liaison position is often filled by those wearing other hats: principals, administrators, the Special Education Director, and in some cases the Superintendent are also acting as the homeless liaison.

This doesn't allow for the intensive support and services that students need and deserve with their unique and oftentimes complicated needs. It does not allow for local or county liaisons to always have the time to have the subject matter expertise necessary to know how to properly implement all of the statutes related to homeless education in all situations. A recent survey by UC San Francisco showed that 50 percent of local liaisons have five hours or less per week to spend on their homeless education duties.

The HETACs provide critical support to county office of Ed and school districts to ensure educational access and success of children and youth experiencing homelessness. The HETACs have been able to bring professional development and technical assistance more easily and broadly to COEs in support of their LEAs to quickly answer questions, give guidance, provide training toolkits and samples for LEAs strained by time and other responsibilities. This helps ensure that students are receiving the supports and entitlements that they deserve.

This is especially important considering that research has shown that lack of a high school diploma or GED is the single greatest risk factor for future homelessness. Education plays a critical role in homeless response. These funds would represent the first state investment in students experiencing homelessness and would come at a critical time as other funding sources are expiring. For these reasons, I'm in strong support of the 1.5 million allocation for homeless education technical assistance centers in the Governor's proposed budget. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Welcome.

Good morning. My name is Dr. Jennifer Kottke, and I am the Homeless Education Project Director too with the Los Angeles County Office of Education. I want to thank you for hearing this important matter today. In my role as the County Office Homeless Liaison for LACO, I serve and support the 80 school districts and 370 plus charter schools within LA County.

We have a count of over 58,000 identified McKinney-Vento students in LA County and many more that have not been identified and should be, and I have the honor of also have being selected as one of the three Homeless Education Technical Assistance Center leads and I've had the privilege to work alongside Contra Costa County and San Diego County these past two and a half years. Today, I want to express my strong support for the 1.5 million dollars allocated for the HETACs.

Currently, California relies solely on federal funds to support the student population, so in allowing the 1.5 million dollars to remain in the budget to support the HETACs, California will be taking pivotal steps to towards intentionally investing in supporting the work for ensuring our students experiencing homelessness are not just surviving, but they're thriving.

This funding will allow us to continue work that has drawn the 58 county offices of education homeless liaisons together to support and support and network them around the use of education to be a life-changing avenue and to ensure it is the preventative tool it should be to avoid young people from entering into our HUD homeless systems.

HETAC funding has and will help to continue to build capacity in our County Office of Education, which trickles down to our districts and our charters and ultimately empowers families and students. This funding will allow us to do the work we should be doing with a deep hope that the outcomes will draw the State of California to want to continue to invest in this life-changing work, particularly with additional funding needed to properly support this population, and for this reason, I strongly support the 1.5 million dollars allocated for the HETAC. Thank you again for your time.

Thank you very much. Welcome to the Committee.

Thank you. Good morning. So you've now met two of the HETACs, and I'm the third one. I'm Alejandra Chamberlain. I am with the Contra Costa County Office of Education. I've had the pleasure to work with Susie and Jennifer, LA and San Diego. These last two years have been amazing as everything they've said, the HETACs have really given an arm to CDE to support the COEs and the LEAs.

What I hope to accomplish by sharing my thoughts and perspective is to pull on the hearts of you all sitting up there. When we are thinking about our LEAs, we're particularly thinking about our children and youth who are experiencing homelessness. And when I heard your comments in regards to what do the HETACs do to really support the LEAs in regards to technical assistance and professional development.

And that is really thinking about solutions, how we could support our children and youth, and you might be thinking like, what does that really mean? So I have the pleasure of meeting monthly with our school districts. And not too long ago, I want to say, two weeks ago, we had San Francisco Unified School District present their stay-over program, which was already mentioned, where they took their gym and they created it into a shelter after school hours.

That took incredible work, collaboration, coordination, innovation, not only from the liaison, the district, the city, the county, and to really get the community to understand that every family, every child, every youth should have somewhere to stay. So we brought them to our monthly meeting, and I hopefully inspired some of our districts to do the same. We have a crucial homeless crisis in our county, Contra Costa.

And ENiOc is particularly one of the cities who continues to say to me, Alejandra, what am I supposed to do when I have a 17-year-old coming to my door on a Friday at 3:00 saying, 'I have nowhere to go?' As a community, we have to do more for our children and youth because they don't become homeless when they turn 18 so that they could get HUD services, right? They become homeless before that.

But our community doesn't see it because they don't see, they don't fit the HUD definition. But who sees it every day, in and out, is our liaisons, not only at the district level, but at the COE level. And so this funding gives our liaisons an opportunity to collaborate and coordinate more effectively on behalf of every child and youth experiencing homelessness. So when you think about your constituents, think about all of those children and youth who are experiencing homelessness. Thank you.

I let you go way over, but you had a message that I didn't really want to interrupt.

My legs were getting a little shaky, so pardon my sitting down. Good morning. My name is Amy Molina-Jones, and I'm the Director of Prevention, Support, and Services with the Yuba County Office of Education. I've been with the COE for over 30 years, and I am proudly the homeless liaison for the county. We have received support from the HETAC that has changed the way we do business in the County of Yuba.

With the guidance from my colleagues from CTAC, our department has engaged homeless youth more intensely than we have ever before. Our HETAC connected us with a professor from UC Berkeley where we learned how to conduct youth forums. We partnered with our by-county Salvation Army and conducted a Y-Plan, which was essentially, we captured the thoughts of our youth regarding their lack of housing. Our first forum took place right before the holidays, and our youth voiced concerns about food insecurities.

In response, our staff did a deeper dive with our local food bank. Not only did we provide the location of where they could pick up food boxes, but we arranged transportation for our families to get those boxes. Similarly to the project you mentioned earlier, Senator Laird, in Monterey County, it takes a lot of man hours, and--

I'm sure you meant person hours.

I did, absolutely.

Just checking.

It takes a lot of people and relationship-building and trust. Through the consultation with our colleagues from CTAC, I've also become the squeaky wheel for our continuum of care. My representation at monthly meetings has brought attention to the CoCs to address them serving our youth with local funding. As a result, our Department will receive local funds to expand services through the Homeless Housing Assistance Program, which in turn will provide funding for a full time staff dedicated to serving our homeless youth. But it's the partnership--

If you could begin to wrap up?

Okay. The partnership with the HETAC has greatly been instrumental in opening those doors for the funding and with that, I just hope that we can continue to fund the HETAC. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Welcome to the Committee.

Thank you. Good morning. Denise Clarke with Contra Costa County Office of Education. I've supported the Education for Homeless Children and Youth Program in Contra Costa for over ten years, and want to express my strong support for the allocation of 1.5 million towards the HETAC in California. These centers play a crucial role in providing essential support and resources to homeless education liaisons across all 58 counties in our state.

Additionally, they serve as a vital statewide resource hub, the first statewide resource hub, in addition to CDE's website equipping all educators with the tools and knowledge necessary to effectively identify and support students experiencing homelessness. While each district or LEA has a homeless education liaison, as was mentioned earlier, it could be anybody from a principal, a superintendent, a school counselor. There's high turnover in those positions. This homeless education liaisons face significant challenges in providing adequate support without sufficient resources and guidance.

The HETAC serve as invaluable partners in this endeavor, offering specialized training, technical assistance, and access to best practices. By fostering collaboration and offering statewide resources, HETACs enhance our ability to address student homelessness comprehensively through strategies like knowledge sharing and capacity building. They empower educators to recognize early signs of homelessness, intervene promptly, and connect students and families with vital services.

I urge you to prioritize and approve the 1.5 million allocation for the Homeless Educational Technical Assistance Center in the upcoming budget, and your support will ensure the continuation of this critical assistance provided by the HETACs. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Welcome.

Good morning. Paige Clark with the National Center for Youth Law. Thank you for the opportunity to provide comments this morning. As the state grapples with an increasingly challenging budget picture, we ask the Legislature to maintain critical supports and services to support some of our most underserved students, those experiencing homelessness.

Data shows that students experiencing homelessness are graduating high school at rates about 15 percentage points below their peers, and the two leading risk factors for adult homelessness are not having a high school diploma and experiencing homelessness as a young person.

Students experiencing homelessness are also more likely to be impacted by chronic absenteeism, school mobility, and exclusionary discipline policies. With American Rescue Plan funding expiring later this year, much of the work my colleagues do to strengthen our system's capacity to serve our students will end, and we can expect to continue to not meet the needs in the way our students require and deserve. For these reasons, we request the ongoing budget support to the tune of 1.5 million dollars for the Homeless Education Technical Assistance Centers. Thank you.

Thank you very much, and thank you for your patience. Last but not least.

Thank you, Chair and Members. Derick Lennox, on behalf of the California County Superintendents, representing the 58 County Superintendents of Schools. I intentionally stood at the back of the line because the most important messengers already came before me when it came to the Homeless Education Technical Assistance Centers. Every county office plays a technical assistance role in supporting the districts and students in their county.

So the only thing left for me to say is that on behalf of the 58 County Superintendents, they're all lending their support for that proposal and the messages that you heard earlier. Thank you.

Thank you very much. We appreciate your comments. That completes the public comment and completes the business of this hearing. I want to reiterate that if you didn't testify today and you want to let the Committee know of your opinions, make sure you go to our webpage or that will also give the address to write.

And if any of you felt like you were too limited in your comments, feel free to write a letter expanding on what--you let us know so that we benefit from them. That concludes the business for today's hearing. The Senate Budget Subcommittee 1 on Education stands adjourned.