Clark County schools join national food service alliance

The Clark County School District’s food service department is joining with other large urban districts nationwide to share best practices and bring prices down.

Formed in 2012, the Urban School Food Alliance began in New York City and has expanded to include some of the nation’s largest school districts. Clark County, the nation’s fifth-largest district, recently joined the ranks, along with public school districts in Philadelphia and Baltimore.

“We want to improve it (school food program) but how do we do that,” said Eric Goldstein, the alliance’s chairman and head of school support services for the New York City Department of Education. “We don’t have any legislative power to make any rules or regulations, but we do have the power of operations. We want to put that power to good use.”

The school districts are able to share best practices and work through other issues common to large food service departments. They’re also able to work through the bidding and procurement process together and often times, can bring down prices.

“There’s a collaborative effort,” said David Wines, food service department director in Clark County.

Goldstein offered an example of how it can work.

In New York, officials want to move away from square, institutional-looking trays to some type of circular tray that they hoped would create a more homelike environment. Trays also had to be compostable, Goldstein said.

Officials found a company that made such a product, but the price quoted for the New York district alone was 15 cents a tray. But when other districts in the alliance got involved, the company lowered the price to about 5 cents a tray.

“That’s what we use every day,” he said.

Wines said it is too early to tell whether Clark County would jump in on those kinds of bids, but he said officials would review them to see if they offer potential cost savings.

Contact Meghin Delaney at 702-383-0821 or mdelaney@reviewjournal.com. Follow @MeghinDelaney on Twitter.