TRENTON – Legislation sponsored by Assemblyman Bob Andrzejczak that would make it easier for schools to donate excess and unused food , and help reduce food waste was approved by a Senate panel.
“Food pantries provide an honorable and important service and deserve our support,” said Andrzejczak (D-Cape May/Atlantic/Cumberland). “If we make it easier to donate food, I’m certain our school districts and colleges and universities will step up to the plate, and support the food banks and charities in the state that are so instrumental to the survival of our less fortunate residents.”
The bill (A-3056) would require the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), in consultation with other appropriate state agencies, to establish voluntary guidelines for K-12 schools and institutions of higher education to reduce, recover and recycle food waste.
These guidelines would include, but not be limited to: (1) information on food waste, and the benefits of reducing, recovering and recycling food waste; (2) recommendations on how schools may incorporate this information into their curricula, and create programs and activities for the reduction, recovery and recycling of food waste; (3) recommendations for how schools can reduce the volume of surplus food they generate; (4) guidance on how schools can create share tables in their cafeterias; (5) information on cost-effective, safe, and sanitary means by which schools may donate excess, unused, and edible food to nonprofit organizations that distribute food to needy individuals; and (6) information on how schools can recycle their food waste.
The DEP, the Department of Education, and the Office of the Secretary of Higher Education would be required to post the guidelines on their websites.
The bill would also amend the “Food Bank Good Samaritan Act” to extend legal immunity to public and nonpublic schools that donate food that appears to be fit for human consumption at the time it is donated to a nonprofit organization. Institutions of higher education already receive such immunity under the act.
The bill was approved by the Senate Environment and Energy Committee. It was approved 72-0-0 by the Assembly in May, but since it was amended today by the committee, it will have to go before the full Assembly again.
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