Tonight I am going to the fall conference for region 12 of the WASB as the Madison Metropolitan School District's delegate. This is one of the few opportunities where board members get together, share information and discuss advocacy at a state level.
The agenda for tonight's meeting will include: recognizing the award-winning work of students in grades K-12 who submitted books in the WASB Write and Illustrate Your Own Book contest; presenting the WASB Board Governance Awards; holding our election for our WASB regional director; and, ending with a keynote presentation on Achievement Beyond High School.
I'm excited to learn from leading experts and fellow board members about what we can do to create a path to (post-secondary) success for our students. I will also be presenting on behalf of the MMSD board of education two resolutions that I recently submitted as part of our state advocacy efforts through WASB.
It should be a great meeting.
The resolutions submitted to our regional delegation are:
Proposal for the 2009 WASB Delegate Assembly Subject: Cooperative purchasing program
Submitted by: The School Board of the Madison Metropolitan School District
Resolution:
Be it RESOLVED that the Wisconsin Association of School Boards (“WASB”) shall call on the State legislature to commit resources towards the coordination and expansion of the State’s cooperative purchasing program to address the needs of school districts and other units of local government.
Rationale:
All levels of government—state, county, local, and school districts—are under pressure to use tax dollars wisely in these times of economic stress.
School Districts’ budgets in particular have been constrained by state statutes on revenue limits for 15 years, leading to many cuts in programs and employees.
The investment by the state to coordinate this purchasing service would benefit all levels of government by lowering their costs.
Leveraging the combined purchasing volume of both state agencies and local governmental units would lower the costs of acquiring goods and services and ultimately benefit the taxpayers of our state.
Proposal for the 2009 WASB Delegate Assembly Subject: Localized Purchasing in School Nutrition Programs
Submitted by: The School Board of the Madison Metropolitan School District
Resolution:
WHEREAS School Boards recognize the connection between a healthy diet and a student’s ability to learn effectively and experience success in school; and
WHEREAS School Boards recognize the school district’s role, as part of the larger community, to establish and maintain life-long healthy eating habits, to support the local economy, and to act as a good steward of community resources;
THEREFORE, be it RESOLVED that School Boards in Wisconsin shall actively promote the purchase of local products and produce from local farms in their respective county or region, based upon availability, and be it further RESOLVED that school districts should work together with CESAs and county organizations to coordinate a list of producers to increase the amount of products purchased from local farms and organic food suppliers.
Rationale:
Recent changes enacted as part of the Food, Conservation, and Energy Act of 2008 address procurements in Child Nutrition Programs, amending the Richard B. Russell National School Lunch Act to require the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture to encourage institutions to purchase unprocessed locally-grown and locally-raised agricultural products. Specifically, “The Secretary shall … allow institutions receiving funds … to use a geographic preference for the procurement of unprocessed agricultural products, both locally grown and locally raised.” (P.L. 110-246, Sec. 4302).
Effective October 1, 2008, the National School Lunch Act allows institutions (including school districts) to apply a geographic preference when procuring unprocessed locally grown or locally raised agricultural products. Appropriate geographic preferences would include, State, county, region, etc.
Moreover, as Woodbury (IA) County Rural Economic Development Director Robert Marqusee stated for the July 2007 National Association of Counties publication on Local Food Systems and sustainable communities, “Most people think we have to look outside of [our county] to reinvigorate our economy … We simply have to be willing to support local farmers and help them develop products that are lucrative in today’s markets rather than putting them out of business just to save a few dollars in the short term.” [http://www.farmtoschool.org/files/publications_133.pdf]
[See http://www.fns.usda.gov/cnd/Governance/Policy-Memos/2008/SP_30-2008.pdf]
Approved by motion of the School Board of the Madison Metropolitan School District on September 8, 2008.
