Senate Bill No. 725
(By Senators Foster and Stollings)
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[Introduced February 18, 2008; referred to the Committee on
Health and Human Resources; and then to the Committee on
Education.]
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A BILL to amend and reenact §18-2-6a of the Code of West Virginia,
1931, as amended, relating to sale of beverages in schools;
requiring the State Board of Education to establish nutrition
standards for such sales; and providing that proceeds from
sales from federally funded nutrition programs accrue to the
benefit of those programs.
Be it enacted by the Legislature of West Virginia:
That §18-2-6a of the Code of West Virginia, 1931, as amended,
be amended and reenacted to read as follows:
ARTICLE 2. STATE BOARD OF EDUCATION.
§18-2-6a. Sale of healthy beverages and soft drinks in schools.
(a)
In order to generate funding for necessary programs and
supplies, county boards may permit the sale of healthy beverages
and soft drinks in county schools except during breakfast and lunch periods as follows:
(1) During a school day, soft drinks may not be sold in areas
accessible to students in an elementary school, middle school or
junior high school through vending machines on the premises, in
school stores or in school canteens or through fund raisers by
students, teachers, groups or by any other means. In elementary,
middle school or junior high school, only healthy beverages may be
sold in vending machines on the premises, in school canteens or
through fund raisers by students, teachers, groups or by any other
means. Nothing in this section shall be construed to prohibit or
limit sale or distribution of any food or beverage item through
fund-raising activities of students, teachers or educational groups
when the items are intended for sale off the school grounds.
(2) Those high schools which permit the sale of soft drinks
through vending machines also shall offer for sale healthy
beverages. Of the total beverages offered for sale, at least fifty
percent shall be healthy beverages. Vending machines containing
healthy beverages shall be in the same location or substantially
similar location as vending machines containing soft drinks. The
State Board of Education shall establish policies for nutrition
standards and the sale of beverages in schools. In developing
these standards the state board shall consider the health of West
Virginia's children and the funding needed to provide for necessary
programs and supplies for schools.
(3) (b) The sale of
healthy beverages
and soft drinks shall be
in compliance with the rules of the national school lunch program
and the school breakfast program of the state board and the
Nutrition Service of the United States Department of Agriculture.
which became effective on the seventeenth day of June, one thousand
nine hundred eighty-five Seventy-five percent of the profits from
the sale of
healthy beverages
and soft drinks shall be allocated by
a majority vote of the faculty Senate of each school and
twenty-five percent of the profits from the sale of
healthy
beverages
and soft drinks shall be allocated to the purchase of
necessary supplies by the principal of the school:
Provided, That
profits from the sale of beverages offered through federally funded
school nutrition programs shall accrue to the benefit of the
nutrition program.
(b) For the purposes of this section:
(1) "School day" means the period of time between the arrival
of the first student at the school building and the end of the last
instructional period; and
(2) "Healthy beverage" means water, one hundred percent fruit
and vegetable juice, low-fat milk and other juice beverages with a
minimum of twenty percent real juice.
NOTE: The purpose of this bill is regulate the sale of
beverages in schools. It requires the State Board of Education to
establish nutrition standards for such sales. It further provides
that proceeds from sales from federally funded nutrition programs accrue to the benefit of those programs. Finally, the bill strikes
the definitions of "school day" and "healthy beverage".
Strike-throughs indicate language that would be stricken from
the present law, and underscoring indicates new language that would
be added.