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Free School Meals for All Here to Stay in California

With 1 in every 6 children facing hunger in the U.S., California is the first state to promise that every public school student — all 6 million of them – will get free school meals.

Published

4 years ago

July 31, 2021

Christy Price

Nancy Skinner

With 1 in every 6 children facing hunger in the U.S., California is the first state to promise that every public school student — all 6 million of them – will get free school meals.

The universal school meals program, which will launch in the 2022-2023 school year, is part of the landmark state budget agreement reached between Gov. Gavin Newsom and the Legislature last month. Days later, Maine became the second state to commit to offering a universal school meals program with the signing of its budget.

The program ensures that all students will be offered breakfast and lunch at their school, which state Sen. Nancy Skinner, D-Berkeley, said is “essential to learning.” Skinner has led the effort to establish a universal school meal program.

“We know that many California children are food insecure, and if you’re hungry you cannot learn well,” Skinner said. “The whole point of school is learning, and everything we can do to create an environment that allows children to thrive and learn is what we need to do.”

Skinner introduced a bill in March that would have established a universal school meal program. After the program garnered bipartisan support and the California Department of Finance forecast unexpectedly large projected revenues, lawmakers opted to include it in the state budget rather than as a separate bill.

The final agreement between Newsom and the Legislature calls for $650 million through the Proposition 98 fund each year to reimburse school districts starting in 2022, as well as $54 million in the 2021-22 fiscal year to supplement state meal reimbursements. Proposition 98 is the formula that determines what portion of the general fund goes to community colleges and K-12 schools.

The state program is set to begin in the 2022-23 school year because the U.S. Department of Agriculture has already committed to paying for school meals for all students through the 2021-22 school year.

The USDA has reimbursed districts for providing free meals to all students since the start of the pandemic. Before the pandemic, districts were only reimbursed for feeding students who were enrolled in the National School Lunch Program. Advocates said being able to feed students without having to check whether they qualified for free lunches allowed districts to serve more families at a time when many faced hunger and hardship.

Waiving the eligibility requirements allowed the Oakland Unified School District, for example, to distribute as many as 18,000 grab-and-go meals a day during the pandemic, said spokesman John Sasaki.

“That just goes to show the need that was there,” Sasaki said.

Previously, as part of the National School Lunch Program application process, families had to disclose their household income, how many people lived in the household, their children’s immigration status or if their children were homeless or runaways. Some families feared giving out that information, and students may have felt embarrassed to receive a free meal while others paid for it.

Schools in New York City began serving free meals to all students in 2017 after finding that some students would rather go hungry than admit they didn’t have enough money to pay for lunch. The decision followed a national outcry over “lunch shaming” — publicly shaming students for unpaid school meal bills, or even school staff throwing away their lunches rather than allowing them to eat.

Advocates believed that though 3.9 million students – 63% of California’s student body — participated in the program, the need was actually much higher.

“It’s such good news that everybody gets food with no strings attached, but to be able to do it in a way that nobody is called out is the best thing about this,” Sasaki said. “We want to make sure kids are never given a hard time for being who they are or being in the situation they are in.”

Districts will still be asking families to fill out household income eligibility forms, however. That’s because the number of families in the district that make so little that they qualify for the federal free and reduced-price lunch program remains a key factor in the state’s Local Control Funding Formula. The formula gives additional state funds to districts based on the number of low-income students, English learners, foster children and homeless youth they serve.

Tony Wold, the West Contra Costa Unified associate superintendent of business services, said the district was concerned that fewer families would fill out the household income eligibility forms because they didn’t have to in order to receive free meals. That could have potentially led to a reduction in supplemental funds for the cash-strapped district. To help solve the problem, the district had outreach workers call families directly, explaining why it was important for families to submit the information.

The outreach workers’ “big lift” resulted in more families filling out the forms than the previous year, Wold said, which kept the district’s unduplicated pupils percentage constant. That statistic measures the share of a district’s students who are low-income, homeless, foster youth or English learners — all of which drive the Local Control Funding Formula.

Outreach workers at Oakland Unified emphasize to families who are skeptical about the forms that they determine how much money goes to the classroom, Sasaki said.

California School Boards Association spokesman Troy Flint said the organization anticipates it will be harder for districts to collect income eligibility forms with the new universal meals program. The association hopes the state will provide some support to schools’ “diligent and creative efforts” to collect the forms, though the group isn’t calling for any specific change.

“This administration has prioritized steering additional money toward high-need students, particularly into concentration grants, so there’s reason to believe they might be willing to work toward a modification here,” Flint said.

Christy Price

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Oakland Post: Week of November 5 – 11, 2025

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of November 5 – 11, 2025

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4 hours ago

November 7, 2025

Oakland Post

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Oakland Post: Week of October 29 – November 4, 2025

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of October 29 – November 4, 2025

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4 days ago

November 3, 2025

Oakland Post

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Past, Present, Possible! Oakland Residents Invited to Reimagine the 980 Freeway

Organizers ask attendees coming to 1233 Preservation Park Way to think of the event as a “time portal”—a walkable journey through the Past (harm and flourishing), Present (community conditions and resilience), and Future (collective visioning).

Published

2 weeks ago

October 27, 2025

Oakland Post

Hundreds of residents in West Oakland were forced out by eminent domain before construction began on the 980 freeway in 1968. Courtesy photo.

By Randolph Belle
Special to The Post

Join EVOAK!, a nonprofit addressing the historical harm to West Oakland since construction of the 980 freeway began in 1968, will hold a block party on Oct. 25 at Preservation Park for a day of imagination and community-building from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Organizers ask attendees coming to 1233 Preservation Park Way to think of the event as a “time portal”—a walkable journey through the Past (harm and flourishing), Present (community conditions and resilience), and Future (collective visioning).

Activities include:

Interactive Visioning: Site mapping, 3-D/digital modeling, and design activities to reimagine housing, parks, culture, enterprise, and mobility.
Story & Memory: Oral history circles capturing life before the freeway, the rupture it caused, and visions for repair.
Data & Policy: Exhibits on health, environment, wealth impacts, and policy discussions.
Culture & Reflection: Films, installations, and performances honoring Oakland’s creativity and civic power.

The site of the party – Preservation Park – itself tells part of the story of the impact on the community. Its stately Victorians were uprooted and relocated to the site decades ago to make way for the I-980 freeway, which displaced hundreds of Black families and severed the heart of West Oakland. Now, in that same space, attendees will gather to reckon with past harms, honor the resilience that carried the community forward, and co-create an equitable and inclusive future.

A Legacy of Resistance

In 1979, Paul Cobb, publisher of the Post News Group and then a 36-year-old civil-rights organizer, defiantly planted himself in front of a bulldozer on Brush Street to prevent another historic Victorian home from being flattened for the long-delayed I-980 Freeway. Refusing to move, Cobb was arrested and hauled off in handcuffs—a moment that landed him on the front page of the Oakland Tribune.

Cobb and his family had a long history of fighting for their community, particularly around infrastructure projects in West Oakland. In 1954, his family was part of an NAACP lawsuit challenging the U.S. Post Office’s decision to place its main facility in the neighborhood, which wiped out an entire community of Black residents.

In 1964, they opposed the BART line down Seventh Street—the “Harlem of the West.” Later, Cobb was deeply involved in successfully rerouting the Cypress Freeway out of the neighborhood after the Loma Prieta earthquake.

The 980 Freeway, a 1.6-mile stretch, created an ominous barrier severing West Oakland from Downtown. Opposition stemmed from its very existence and the national practice of plowing freeways through Black communities with little input from residents and no regard for health, economic, or social impacts. By the time Cobb stood before the bulldozer, construction was inevitable, and his fight shifted toward jobs and economic opportunity.

Fast-forward 45 years: Cobb recalled the story at a convening of “Super OGs” organized to gather input from legacy residents on reimagining the corridor. He quickly retrieved his framed Tribune front page, adding a new dimension to the conversation about the dedication required to make change. Themes of harm repair and restoration surfaced again and again, grounded in memories of a thriving, cohesive Black neighborhood before the freeway.

The Lasting Scar

The 980 Freeway was touted as a road to prosperity—funneling economic opportunity into the City Center, igniting downtown commerce, and creating jobs. Instead, it cut a gash through the city, erasing 503 homes, four churches, 22 businesses, and hundreds of dreams. A promised second approach to the Bay Bridge never materialized.

Planning began in the late 1940s, bulldozers arrived in 1968, and after years of delays and opposition, the freeway opened in 1985. By then, Oakland’s economic engines had shifted, leaving behind a 600-foot-wide wound that resulted in fewer jobs, poorer health outcomes, and a divided neighborhood. The harm of displacement and loss of generational wealth was compounded through redlining, disinvestment, drugs, and the police state. Many residents fled to outlying cities, while those who stayed carried forward the spirit of perseverance.

The Big Picture

At stake now is up to 67 acres of new, buildable land in Downtown West Oakland. This time, we must not repeat the institutional wrongs of the past. Instead, we must be as deliberate in building a collective, equitable vision as planners once were in destroying communities.

EVOAK!’s strategy is rooted in four pillars: health, housing, economic development, and cultural preservation. These were the very foundations stripped away, and they are what they aim to reclaim. West Oakland continues to suffer among the worst social determinants of health in the region, much of it linked to the three freeways cutting through the neighborhood.

The harms of urban planning also decimated cultural life, reinforced oppressive public safety policies, underfunded education, and fueled poverty and blight.

Healing the Wound

West Oakland was once the center of Black culture during the Great Migration—the birthplace of the Black Panther Party and home to the “School of Champions,” the mighty Warriors of McClymonds High. Drawing on that legacy, we must channel the community’s proud past into a bold, community-led future that restores connection, sparks innovation, and uplifts every resident.

Two years ago, Caltrans won a federal Reconnecting Communities grant to fund Vision 980, a community-driven study co-led by local partners. Phase 1 launched in Spring 2024 with surveys and outreach; Phase 2, a feasibility study, begins in 2026. Over 4,000 surveys have already been completed. This once-in-a-lifetime opportunity could transform the corridor into a blank slate—making way for accessible housing, open space, cultural facilities, and economic opportunity for West Oakland and the entire region.

Leading with Community

In parallel, EVOAK! is advancing a community-led process to complement Caltrans’ work. EVOAK! is developing a framework for community power-building, quantifying harm, exploring policy and legislative repair strategies, structuring community governance, and hosting arts activations to spark collective imagination. The goal: a spirit of co-creation and true collaboration.

What EVOAK! Learned So Far

Through surveys, interviews, and gatherings, residents have voiced their priorities: a healthy environment, stable housing, and opportunities to thrive. Elders with decades in the neighborhood shared stories of resilience, community bonds, and visions of what repair should look like.

They heard from folks like Ezra Payton, whose family home was destroyed at Eighth and Brush streets; Ernestine Nettles, still a pillar of civic life and activism; Tom Bowden, a blues man who performed on Seventh Street as a child 70 years ago; Queen Thurston, whose family moved to West Oakland in 1942; Leo Bazille who served on the Oakland City Council from 1983 to 1993; Herman Brown, still organizing in the community today; Greg Bridges, whose family’s home was picked up and moved in the construction process; Martha Carpenter Peterson, who has a vivid memory of better times in West Oakland; Sharon Graves, who experienced both the challenges and the triumphs of the neighborhood; Lionel Wilson, Jr., whose family were anchors of pre-freeway North Oakland; Dorothy Lazard, a resident of 13th Street in the ’60s and font of historical knowledge; Bishop Henry Williams, whose simple request is to “tell the truth,” James Moree, affectionately known as “Jimmy”; the Flippin twins, still anchored in the community; and Maxine Ussery, whose father was a business and land owner before redlining.

EVOAK! will continue to capture these stories and invites the public to share theirs as well.

Beyond the Block Party

The 980 Block Party is just the beginning. Beyond this one-day event, EVOAK! Is building a long-term process to ensure West Oakland’s future is shaped by those who lived its past. To succeed, EVOAK! Is seeking partners across the community—residents, neighborhood associations, faith groups, and organizations—to help connect with legacy residents and host conversations.

980 Block Party Event Details
Saturday, Oct. 25
10 a.m. – 4 p.m.
Preservation Park, 1233 Preservation Park Way, Oakland, CA 94612
980BlockParty.org
info@evoak.org