All students in the DeKalb County School System, regardless of income, will have access to free lunches when school begins in August under a federal program the Board of Education has decided to join. But the current rate of students participating in the lunch program has to increase by at least five percent to keep the school’s nutrition program from losing money.

During the regular monthly meeting Thursday night, the school board voted to participate in the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Community Eligibility Program and offer free lunches starting this fall on a trial basis. If the program is not self supporting, the school board can opt out.
CEP is a universal meal plan under the National School Lunch Program that permits eligible districts and schools to provide meal service to all students at no charge. DeKalb County schools are already offering free breakfasts under the Universal Breakfast Program.
According to Amy Lattimore, School Nutrition Supervisor, rather than collecting and processing individual applications for federal free and reduced priced lunches under the National School Lunch Program, schools would serve all meals at no cost under CEP.
The school system would then be reimbursed using a formula based on the percentage of students identified as eligible for free meals, one that relies on information from other programs such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.
“We are in the National School Lunch Program and we are currently reimbursed for school meals across three categories: paid, free, and reduced. How that works is a “free” child comes through the lunch line and they don’t give us any money. The state gives us $3.06 . A “reduced” child comes through the lunch line and they give us 40 cents while the state gives us $2.66. A paying student comes through the lunch line and they give us $1.50 or $1.75 depending on their age range and the state gives us 36 cents. So we’re always getting the student payments and the reimbursement combined. That’s how we fund our program. With CEP we don’t get reimbursed across three categories. They do away with the categories and its through a formula that we would get reimbursed,” said Lattimore.
The school system’s nutrition program also receives income from a la carte sales, teacher meals, and visitor meals and that would continue under CEP.
While the school system would get a greater reimbursement of funds under CEP, it would no longer receive income from students who are currently paying for their lunches resulting in the nutrition program actually losing money overall unless more students take advantage. Currently school nutrition is self supporting in DeKalb County.
“With CEP we will actually receive more reimbursement but we would no longer receive any student payments. If we serve the same amount of kids with CEP we would lose money. For CEP to work in DeKalb County, participation has to go up. That’s how we would make it work. Currently we have about 67% of our students eating lunch with us every day. About 44% are eating breakfast. When we started Universal breakfast we had a 3% increase in participation. We should see a higher increase for lunch but participation has to come up by at least 5% to stay where we are now (self supporting). That’s in a perfect world where our a la carte sales stay the same. Our teacher meals stay the same and our visitor meals stay the same. If we don’t we’ll lose money,” said Lattimore.
Should the free lunch program fail to be self supporting, the school board would have to move funds from the general purpose budget to the nutrition program to cover the costs, which could be as much as $3,000 per month. However, the school board could chose to opt out of CEP at any time and stop offering universal free lunches.
If free lunches were stopped under CEP during the midst of the school year, Lattimore said it could create hassles for parents and staff with having to again begin processing free and reduced priced applications so late in the year. “Kids must apply for a free and reduced application or they are directly certified through the state. If we do CEP at the beginning of the year they are not sending in those applications. If we have to stop CEP in mid year because we’re losing money, we’ll have to get in all those applications in mid year. It’ll be a hassle for parents and staff,” she said.
Danny Parkerson, First District School Board member, made a motion to start the free lunch program saying it would save families money. Fourth District member Kate Miller offered a second to the motion. All board members voted in favor.

The DCHS Tigerettes will face Chattanooga Central on Tuesday, May 19 at 5:30 p.m. in the first round of the TSSAA Class AA State Girls’ Softball Tournament in Murfreesboro.
The tournament will be held at the Murfreesboro Sports Complex & McKnight Fields
The game featuring the DCHS Tigerettes (27-6) and Chattanooga Central (20-14) will be played at Starplex #2
WJLE plans LIVE coverage.
(Click the link below to view the tournament bracket)http://projects.tssaa.org/brackets/bracket.cfm?id=8

The DCHS Tigerettes are bound for the state softball tournament after coming from behind to defeat Polk County 6-4 Friday in the Sub-State played in Smithville.
This will be the seventh trip to the state tournament in the program’s thirty year existence under Coach Danny Bond (1992, 1994, 1996, 2001, 2008, 2014, & 2015) and the first time DCHS softball teams will have made state tournament appearances two years in a row (2014 and 2015). This is also the third DCHS softball team in program history to have won championships for the regular season district, district tournament, region tournament, and sub-state before advancing to the state tournament (1992, 1994, & 2015)
Down 4 to 2 with the bases loaded in the sixth inning, Myranda Bailiff delivered a grand slam homerun to give the Tigerettes the lead and the eventual win.
Kayley Caplinger, the winning pitcher, faced twenty eight batters through seven innings. She gave up four runs on seven hits, struck out nine, and walked none.
DeKalb County scored six runs on six hits and made three errors. Polk County scored four runs on seven hits and made two errors.
The Tigerettes scored one run in the third and fourth innings and four runs in the sixth. Polk County scored one run in the first and three runs in the fourth inning.
In addition to Bailiff’s grand slam homerun, Kayley Caplinger, Katie Hall, Allison Maynard, and Lexi Bates each had a single and Dani Meadows doubled.
The Tigerettes will make their debut in the State Tournament at Murfreesboro on Tuesday, May 19 at a time to be announced. WJLE plans LIVE coverage.
The DCHS record is now 27-6 for the season. Coach Bond’s all time record as softball coach is 642-250.

Three people are in trouble with the law after Smithville Police found drugs and paraphernalia in their vehicle during a traffic accident investigation last Saturday, May 9.
Captain Steven Leffew said 33 year old Jason Aaron Davis is charged with possession of schedule I & II drugs; 34 year old Wesley M Peterson is cited for having a suspended license; and a juvenile has been issued a citation for simple possession and possession of drug paraphernalia. Both Davis and Peterson will make an appearance in General Sessions Court on June 18.
According to police, Officer Will Judkins was dispatched to an accident at KFC/Taco Bell on Saturday, May 9 at 8:44 p.m. While investigating the mishap Officer Judkins became suspicious of the persons and vehicle involved. Drug Officer James Cornelius and K-9 LEO were brought in to assist and the dog alerted several times on the exterior of the vehicle apparently due to an odor of a narcotic substance. Officers conducted a search of the vehicle and found a black tar substance believed to be Heroin, a bottle containing a liquid substance thought to be Methadone, pills suspected of being Hydroxyzine Pamoate & Duloxetiue Hydrochloride along with marijuana and items that are commonly used with illegal drugs.
Corporal Chip Avera and Officer Lance Dillard assisted in the investigation.
Meanwhile, 19 year old Ernest Willard Dodd Jr. was arrested on Wednesday, May 6 for aggravated assault and violation of an order of protection. His bond is $9,500 and he will be in court June 4. According to police, Officer Matt Farmer was dispatched to a field behind Village Place in response to a physical domestic. Upon arrival he heard yelling and crying and found Dodd and the victim in the middle of the field among a small stand of trees. Officer Farmer spoke with them and found the victim to have marks on her arms, neck and face. He also learned that the woman has an order of protection against Dodd.
In conjunction with the Department of Children Services, Smithville Police arrested 68 year old Patricia Dorene Linder for child abuse on Monday, May 4. According to police, DCS reported an incident to Captain Steven Leffew that day which had occurred involving a juvenile. The charge against Linder was the result of an investigation by Detective Brandon Donnell. Her bond is $5,000 and she will be in court May 28.
43 year old Patsy Lynn Estes McCoy was arrested on Thursday, May 14 for burglary, theft and for resist stop, halt, frisk, arrest, and search. Sergeant Brad Tatrow was called to the emergency room of the hospital in reference to someone burglarizing vehicles in the parking lot. After an investigation McCoy was found to have entered two vehicles in the ER parking lot without the knowledge or consent of the owners and she allegedly took items from each vehicle. Sergeant Tatrow observed McCoy attempting to conceal something in her hand and when he ordered her to produce it she refused. McCoy then pulled away as Sergeant Tatrow tried to retrieve it. Police discovered that McCoy had taken items from the medical floor without the knowledge or consent of hospital personnel. Bond for McCoy is $6,000 and she will be in court on May 28.
Officer Joey Myers took a report on Thursday, May 14 in which a victim reported that as he was leaving Smithville he approached Smith Road and saw a female run into the roadway shouting “help me”. The victim said when he stopped his vehicle to help, a man pulled up in a truck and busted the driver side window of his (victim’s) vehicle with a bottle. The victim said after he drove away, he discovered his left arm was bleeding from the broken window glass. At the time of the call, county deputies were responding to a physical domestic regarding two persons who fit the description of the man and woman involved in this (city) incident. The victim later identified the two with whom he had come in contact. One of them, 25 year old Clinton Lane Cope was cited for vandalism and assault. Cope will be in court on May 28.

The DeKalb County Board of Education has begun the process of selecting a new Director of Schools.
During Thursday night’s regular monthly meeting, the board voted to post a notice on the school system’s website seeking applications for the position from May 15 through June 15.
(Click the first link below to view the posted notice. Click the second link below to view the actual application)
1274_001.pdf (32.67 KB)
http://images.pcmac.org/Uploads/DekalbCountySD/DekalbCountySD/Divisions/…
According to Board Chairman W.J. (Dub) Evins, III the application is basically the same form as was used nine years ago except for a few changes.
“We had a workshop prior to this meeting and all (board members) agreed on the format. The best way to explain this is to say that we are going to start tomorrow (Friday, May 15) and at least start with posting it on our website and have a time line of May 15 to June 15 which would actually be 31 days. In the interim, we will have to do some things ourselves to structure the contract and some more detailed issues but before we do that at least we can get started with posting on the website for anyone interested in applying and details will be on that website. We looked at the application that we did previously nine years ago. We added some more details to that and anyone wanting to see that can get on our website. It’s pretty detailed,” said Evins.
In other business, the board voted to hire Chattanooga attorney Scott Bennett, who specializes in school law, to give advice as needed. “It won’t be a monthly retainer. It will just be a per hour retainer and if there is something of less consequence during the year we can hire someone locally. We’re not obligated in any way to use this gentleman but his name is Scott Bennett. He is with a law firm in Chattanooga who specializes in school law. He is legal counsel for Hamilton County, Coffee County and several other counties. We can talk with him through emails or over the phone for advice. There are two attorneys in the law firm who specialize in school law and their rate is $170 per hour. We still have attorney Randall Bennett, who is no relation (to Scott Bennett) of the Tennessee School Boards Association and we can still get his free advice and counsel but he (Randall Bennett) doesn’t do new contracts for a director so we would have to get someone to do that. Scott Bennett specializes in that,” said Board Chairman Evins.