Montgomery County sentinel., 1958-10-09
By Bob Bernstein
staff Reporter

no progress despite the fact
that its hackers still think it
could save the taxpayers a
wad Of money.
This is the so-called "TV din
ner" proposal, which DR.. Temple
ton says is now saving the
Bremerton, Wash, system about
100000 a year.
Templeton hoped to visit
Bremerton last spring to get re-
actions from all concerned Che
was particularly interested in
seeing how the children liked the
packaged foods. But the board
mixed the trip and hasn't men,
toned the idea since.
Nevertheless, they failed to
cool Templetons ardor.
He points to recent cost
analysis of the systems lunch
program which indicates that
labor and maintenance - items
in which big savings might be
effected by centralized system
NOW account for nearly a third
of the total cost of each lunch.
Templeton isn't too fond of
that "TV dinner" tag. He'd
rather call it a Centralized
school lunch program.
BY any name, it envisiOns
large central cafeterias,
where cooked, packaged
lunches would be prepared
for trucking to the six or
seven schools serviced by
each. (The Bremerton kitch.
en- serves 13 schools, but
TempletOn wouldn't want to
start out on that large a
scale.)
Each elementary school cafe.
terra now costs about $4,000. So
for each group of six new schools
that could do without them. the
capital outlay savings alone
would be about S240,000.
"And you can build a lot of
classrooms with a quarter mil.
lion dollars" Templeton OBJ
serves.
Labor costs would be another
target of the novel plan. At pres
ent, many small schools feed as
few as so or 60 children, but still
have to hire a manager and
helper, besides ins ,alling and
maintaining the basic kitchen
equipment.
Cost-wise. these are strictly
losing operations" Templeton
notes.
He would like to see pilot
project, involving a single serv-
ice group of six or seven schools,
to test the idea.
One hitch, however, is that this
should be planned we'll in adj
vance - so that one school can
be designed with the necessary
expanded. kitchen and storage
facilities and other new schools
can be built without any kitchen
at all.
For example, the new Spring.
brook High School to be occupied
in 1860 could conceivably supply
prepared lunches to such nearby
elementary schools as Fairland,
Jackson Road, Arcola, Forest
Knolls, Colesville and Burtons.
vile.
Where existing schools
already have cafeterias,
these could be converted to
much-needed extra classroom
space, TempletOn said.
The recent cost analysis, incl
dentally showed that children
are getting almost exactly what
they pay for when they buy a
school lunch.
The study may we'll be the
first Of its type in the United
States. Commercial restaurants,
Of course, often run cost analy-
ses, but Templeton says he
knows of no other case where
1t has been done on a school
lunch program.
1t revealed that the schools
are paying 1922 cents for each
lunch served at Parkwood Ele.
mentary School, as compared to
37.S cents at Montgomery Hills
Junior High.
Since the per-meal charge is
35 cents. the price was fully
justified" by the study at the two
schools. DR.. Templeton observed
in his formal report to the Board
of Education.
Templeton admits, however,
that the fieure came out below
his own estimate.
T had ASST med the
lunches were costing us more
than we We're charging"
he said.
The results give Templeton
and his staff firm basis for
making future budget requests,
which in the past have been
little more than "guess.timates,"