10 August 31 - september 6, 2023 dallasobserver.com DALLAS OBSERVER Classified | MusiC | dish | Culture | unfair Park | Contents “Texas Star Ready Mix is proud to be a part of the Joppa community,” the rep said. “We’re honored to be a part of the Joppa community.” A representative with the TCEQ said at the same meeting that a review of the permit application has been completed, and it ap- pears to meet all the technical requirements for the permit. Texas Star Ready Mix sub- mitted the application on January 30. Several people turned out to the meeting and sent in comments in advance opposing the permit. Dallas City Council member Adam Ba- zaldua, who represents the district where Joppa sits, put out a statement ahead of the meeting saying the permit should be denied. “The approval of this permit would be detri- mental to the health of Joppa residents who live adjacent to the batch plant,” he wrote. “The amount of air pollution and particulate matter that the Joppa community has en- dured is greater than any other parts of our city.” Bazaldua said the city learned the plant was operating without the proper per- mit in September 2022. A follow-up visit to the plant on Aug. 9 found the it was still op- erating without the permit. Texas State Rep. Venton Jones, a Demo- crat from Dallas, also released a statement about the proposed permit and sent a repre- sentative to the Crowne Plaza meeting to speak on his behalf. “When considering such permits for con- crete batch plant operations, it is imperative that we consider the environmental and health risks associated with running such a facility near residential homesteads around the proposed location of 4500 Great Trinity Forest Way,” Jones wrote in his statement. The existing sources of pollution in the area include emissions from Austin Indus- tries, TAMKO (a maker of roofing shingles), a nearby railroad, a landfill and other nearby heavy industries, the state representative noted. “The combination of these industries around this community has exacerbated ex- isting health conditions impacting the resi- dents including asthma, heart and respiratory diseases, and cancer,” Jones’s statement read. “Allowing this concrete batch plant to operate would continue to ex- acerbate existing problems community members, government officials and our health department are already working hard to improve.” A representative with the TCEQ ex- plained that the plant uses a dust collector and other measures to clean up the particu- late matter that it creates. And there’s a rea- son why some plants are where they are. Concrete batch plants often have to be close to the areas where building is occurring be- cause of how quickly concrete materials harden, according to the Texas Aggregates and Concrete Association. Kathryn Bazan, chair of Dallas’ Environ- mental Commission, told the Observer the Joppa Freedman’s Town Association has hired Legal Aid of Northwest Texas to help appeal the permitting decision if the permit is approved. For now, the TCEQ will review all the permit-related comments submitted prior to and at the meeting and respond to all of them. After that, the agency will make its decision on the permit. Bazan didn’t sound too confident, saying she’s never seen a permit denied based on public comments. She explained that the plant is already under enforcement with the TCEQ for failure to keep buffer distances for its materials and having an open conveyor system. “So, they’ve already demonstrated that they are not capable or willing to operate that facility in a compliant way and in a way that’s considerate of the health and wellbe- ing of neighbors in Joppa,” she said. ▼ SCHOOLS FEED THE CHILDREN SOME NORTH TEXAS SCHOOL DISTRICTS CONTINUE OFFERING MEALS TO ALL STUDENTS POST- PANDEMIC WHILE THE STATE LAGS BEHIND. BY KELLY DEARMORE T he list of questions a kid in class pon- ders throughout the school day is typically a pretty lengthy one. Day- dreams and concerns regarding crushes and quizzes are just a few of the more pressing concerns. The progression of quizzical thoughts for a student in any grade goes well beyond those, of course. More than many people realize, one question that is often part of that daily inner monologue is, “Am I going to be able to eat anything today?” When a student has that question on their minds, it can tend to overshadow any other thought, making it difficult for them to focus on the teacher and lesson in front of them. Since the earliest days of the COVD-19 pandemic, when schools across the country were allowed to offer free school meals to all students while they en- dured remote learning, the idea that all students should have free meals provided to them, regardless of pandemic condi- tions, has been picking up steam in Dallas and beyond. “It’s a positive way to run a school cafete- ria,” said Crystal FitzSimons, the director of school and out-of-school time programs for the Food Research and Action Center (FRAC), a national advocacy group. “Teach- ers don’t have to worry about kids coming back from lunch hungry or even starting the school day hungry and not ready to learn. There’s a ton of research about the positive impact that school breakfast and school lunch have on academic achievement and health, and a lot of research on the negative impact of food insecurity for kids.” According to the U.S. Department of Ag- riculture, one of every eight households with children struggled to buy enough food for their families in 2021, the most recent year that with such data. In 2022 the U.S. Congress did not renew the waivers that had made school meals free for all during the pandemic. Since then, school dis- tricts and state governments have been left on their own to figure out how to continue offering a ser- vice that many families had become reliant upon over the previous couple of years. It may seem to be a simple equation — child with a full stomach equals greater con- tentment — but a school district’s ability to ensure that at no cost to its students isn’t so simple. There’s the matter of funding to con- sider, along with the great deal of time, re- sources and paperwork often required of a district when applying for places in the Na- tional School Lunch Program and National School Breakfast Program’s Community Eli- gibility Program (CEP). In North Texas, Dallas ISD has offered its students across all campuses and grades free breakfasts and lunches through CEP for the past several years, dating to well before the pandemic. For its 2023–24 school year, Ir- ving ISD began offering free meals to all of its students through the CEP, after having offered free meals to its elementary and middle school students since 2019. Irving ISD spokesperson Jeanine Porter says the benefits for her district transcend simply making sure kids are fed. She says the posi- tive impacts reach school staff, administra- tors and, especially, low-income parents. [pullquote-1-center] “With CEP, parents save money and have less school-related paperwork to complete, and no worries about whether their child will have access to a nutritious school break- fast and lunch,” she said. “Additionally, streamlined meal periods that result from not having to handle meal payments allow for more time for students to eat.” The streamlined process during lunch periods that Porter noted is not an insig- nificant aspect for the students. FRAC’s FitzSimons said that kids from low-in- come families who have qualified for school meal assistance sometimes feel em- barrassment over the designation on cam- puses where it’s no longer set up to be free for everyone. “There’s not supposed to be overt identi- fication of kids who are enrolled in a free or reduced-price program,” she said. “But par- ticularly, as kids get older, they often feel a stigma associated with participating. So, even kids who are eligible for free meals will sometimes opt out of the program, regard- less of how much they need it.” Schools that do not offer free breakfasts and lunches to all also present another di- lemma, thanks to the eligibility require- ments for the federal program. FitzSimons said that current threshold income levels keep some families in need from partici- pating. “There are kids who are not eligible for free or reduced price meals, but their families are struggling, even if they don’t quite qual- ify,” she said. “That means you have kids who need access to free meals who are not eligible, and you have kids that are eligible who do not want them because they’re afraid of being identified as being low-income, and then you have school districts spending a lot time try- ing to identify kids who are eligible for free or reduced price meals.” Some state governments have relieved school districts and families of this burden. Seven states – California, Colorado, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico and Ver- mont – have passed legislation to perma- nently provide free school meals to all students; Colorado did so through a ballot initiative. According to FRAC’s research, the issue is a bipartisan one. Both Republican and Democratic lawmakers have been pro- ponents of free school meals, and 63% of na- tionwide voters support making school meals free on a permanent basis. Texas is one of more than a dozen states not working on temporary or permanent free school meal programs. FitzSimons knows that most school dis- tricts are not flush with cash, and budgets are often very tight, but she’s encouraged by the progress that has been made. The fact is, free meal programs in schools help more kids feel secure about where their next meals will come, resulting in a better shot at doing well in school. It’s an absolute answer to a question many thousands of students have. “I mean,” she added, “it’s not rocket science.” Unfair Park from p8 Unsplash/CDC Texas is one of the states to not offer a statewide free school meal program. “IT’S A POSITIVE WAY TO RUN A SCHOOL CAFETERIA.” - CRYSTAL FITZSIMONS, FOOD RESEARCH AND ACTION CENTER
