Sponsors (6)
The bill ensures students greater access to a range of milk options (including lactose-free) to improve nutrition, but does so at the cost of reducing explicit nondairy authorization and creating procurement and cost uncertainty for schools and districts.
Students (including those who are lactose-intolerant) will have guaranteed access to a broader set of fluid milk options at school — including flavored and lactose-free milk — increasing beverage availability during meals and improving intake of calcium and vitamin D.
Students who avoid dairy for allergy, cultural, or dietary reasons may lose access to explicitly authorized nondairy nutritionally equivalent beverages, reducing safe alternatives and potentially harming nutrition or inclusion for those students.
Removing organic/nonorganic designations and narrowing specified offerings could force schools to renegotiate supplier contracts or change purchasing practices, potentially raising costs for school districts and taxpayers and disrupting meal programs.
Eliminating explicit fat‑content categories (whole, reduced‑fat, low‑fat, fat‑free) creates uncertainty for schools about which milk fat options satisfy the requirement, complicating procurement, menu planning, and compliance.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Requires schools to offer flavored and unflavored fluid milk, permits lactose‑free milk, and removes explicit references to organic/nonorganic, fat levels, and nondairy equivalents.
Introduced January 21, 2025 by Claudia Tenney · Last progress January 21, 2025
Amends the statutory list of milk options that schools must offer under the National School Lunch Program by requiring schools to provide flavored and unflavored fluid milk, allowing (but not requiring) lactose‑free fluid milk, and removing the prior explicit references to organic/nonorganic milk, specific fat‑content categories, and nondairy equivalent beverages. The change narrows and reorders the categories of required and permitted milk offerings, which will affect school meal planning, procurement, dietary accommodations, and suppliers.