Does Local School Data on Students Receiving Free and Reduced Priced Lunches Show Growing Poverty Levels in the East Bay Suburbs?

The other day I wrote a post alerting readers to an article about a federal study saying that poverty is spreading and re-clustering in the suburbs. A very astute reader pointed out that “all one has to do is to look at the demographics for schools in any given area to get a general idea of what the ‘poverty level’ is, specifically the number of students receiving free or reduced priced lunches.”

So, I took this reader's advice and did some digging around the California Department of Education's Ed-Data website, which provides this data. I learned that students become eligible for free and reduced priced meals when their families are enrolled in CalWORKS (California Work Opportunity and Responsibility to Kids). This is a welfare program that provides temporary financial assistance and employment services to needy California families with minor children.

I then pulled together a list of select districts in the East Bay suburbs, mostly in Contra Costa County, but three in Alameda County, and I show selected fiscal years and, for those years, I show the percentage of students among the total number of students enrolled in those districts who are eligiblef or the free and reduced priced meals. For each district, I've highlighted in red the years which had the highest percentage of students receiving free and reduced priced meals.

For some areas, like Pleasanton, and Walnut Creek, it looks like kids and their families are better off than they were 10 years ago. However, Walnut Creek schools have, over the last five years, seen a slow but steady resurgence in need for food assistance for its students. Meanwhile, some districts--Mt. Diablo and some in East Contra Costa, the setting for much of Contra Costa's foreclosure crisis--have seen sharp increases in food assistance needd in just the past fiscal year. Even in Lamorinda or San Ramon Valley, with historically low levels of kids needing food assistance--for example, in Moraga in 1997-98, only 1 student needed this help--there have been slight uptick in the past couple years.

Contra Costa County Overall
1997-98 28.2 percent
2002-03 26.9 percent
2006-07 31.7 percent
2007-08 33.2 percent

Alameda County Overall
1997-98 36.1 percent
2002-03 34.8 percent
2006-07 37.6 percent
2007-08 32.9 percent

Acalanes Union
1997-98: 0.6 percent
2002-03: 0.7 percent
2006-07: o.7 percent
2007-08: 1.1 percent

Antioch Unified
1997-08 34.8 percent
2002-03 31.7 percent
2006-07 44 percent
2007-08 46 percent

Brentwood Union Elementary
1997-98 28.1 percent
2002-03 25.2 percent
2006-07 23.3 percent
2007-08 23.5 percent

Dublin Unified
1997-08 10.7 percent
2002-03 10.4 percent
2006-07 8.3 percent
2007-08 10.2 percent

Lafayette Elementary
1997-98 0.1 percent
2002-03 0.1 percent
2006-07 1.7 percent
2007-08 2.2 percent

Liberty Union High
1997-08 7.1 percent
2002-03 8.8 percent
2006-07 13.3 percent
2007-08 15.7 percent

Livermore Valley Joint Unified
1997-08 14.4 percent
2002-03 13 percent
2006-07 19.5 percent
2007-08 21.5 percent

Martinez Unified
1997-08 21.4 percent
2002-03 17.1 percent
2006-07 17.8 percent
2007-08 20.7 percent

Moraga Elementary
1997-08 0.1 percent
2002-03 0.8 percent,
2006-07 0.8 percent
2007-08 0.6 percent

Mount Diablo Unified
1997-08 24.5 percent
2002-03 27.1 percent
2006-07 30.8 percent
2007-08 33.4 percent

Oakley
1997-08 27.5 percent
2002-03 23.2 percent
2006-07 38.5 percent
2007-08 38.3 percent

Orinda
1997-08 0 percent
2002-03 0.3 percent
2006-07 0.1 percent
2007-08 0.4 percent

Pittsburg Unified
1997-08 61 percent
2002-03 59.7 percent
2006-07 67.6 percent
2007-08 72.3 percent

Pleasanton Unified
1997-08 6.5 percent
2002-03 4 percent
2006-07 4.1 percent
2007-08 4.3 percent

San Ramon Valley Unified
1997-08 1.5 percent
2002-03 1.2 percent
2006-07 1.7 percent
2007-08 2 percent

Walnut Creek
1997-08 9.9 percent
2002-03 6.6 percent
2006-07 7.5 percent
2007-08 7.6 percent