School in compliance with USDA requirements, yet most snacks would fail state health department’s test

In December, the Tooele-Transcript Bulletin reviewed vending machines in Grantsville and Tooele high schools to see if they complied with the district's nutritional vending machine policy.

The machines at neither school were found to be compliant with the district policy that reads: "Vending machines in high schools should dispense offerings of water, fruit juice or milk varieties and should limit the amount of carbonated soda, drinks with caffeine or a high concentration of sugar, candy or chips to 50 percent of items offered."

However, a visit this week to Tooele High School revealed a couple changes.

The school's machines have been moved from the commons area to a small room just off the area where students eat lunch. According to Elva Roberts, district food service department manager, the machines were temporarily moved out of the room as part of the commons-area extension project.

USDA requirements do not allow the sale of foods of minimal nutritional value in places where meals are being served or eaten. To comply with this regulation, Roberts said that either the machines must be turned off or the door to the room locked during lunchtime.

The contents of the machines have changed as well. Half of the beverage choices include water, 100 per cent fruit juices or Powerade.

However, judging the nutritional worth of the snacks dispensed at THS is a highly subjective endeavor. USDA regulations give a tight definition of "foods of minimal nutritional value." The definition includes carbonated beverages, water ices, chewing gum, and certain candies -- hard candies, jellies and gums, marshmallow candies, fondant, licorice, spun candy and sugar coated popcorn. The definition does not include items that most students, parents and teachers would call junk food, such as potato chips, chocolate bars, donuts, snack cakes and cookies. The vending machines at THS are full of chips, pop tarts, trolli gummi snacks, Hostess Dunkin' Stix and an assortment of other snacks.

The Utah Department of Health has adopted recommendations for food sold in Utah schools. Their recommendations allow beverages that contain 100 percent fruit juice with no added sweeteners, water, and low-fat or non-fat milk. Beverages that may not be sold include soft drinks, sports drinks, punches and iced teas, and other drinks with less than 100 percent real fruit juice. Beverages that contain caffeine are also banned under the health department recommendations.

Those recommendations also stipulate that all snacks, sweets or side dishes sold on school sites, outside of approved lunches, should have 30 percent or less of total calories from fat, 10 percent or less of total calories from saturated plus trains fat, and have 35 percent or less of its weight from sugars, excluding natural sugars found in fruits, vegetables and dairy ingredients.

Tim Gillie: tgillie@tooeletranscript.com