Steven Gunderson: “let me begin by saying I am delighted to be on the floor dealing with a school nutrition issue other than milk. The fact…”

“let me begin by saying I am delighted to be on the floor dealing with a school nutrition issue other than milk. The fact is, however, Mr. Chairman, that I rise in strong support of this bill but I think it is important as I do so that we understand part of the problem that we faced over the last couple of years. This is not the first time we have had to deal with all of this. A couple of years ago this whole attempt to regulate through administrative regulations the nutrient standards, et cetera, created such an uproar that we had to take legislative action at that time to make clear that that did not happen. Many of my colleagues will recall about a year ago, when we were asking the question about whether or not we ought to literally block grant our school nutrition programs, give the money and give the authority back to the schools and let them design a program based on the proper meal plan, and, obviously, the nutrition standards that we all sought, that there was all kind of concern that if we let that happen there would be all kinds of problems. Well, I think what we are doing today is we are witnessing the problems on the other side once again. Anybody who believes that a one-size-fits-all Washington mentality is going to be able to deal with this issue, does not understand the real life of school nutrition.”