Schools to offer free breakfast

By Rachel Wachman Record-Journal staff

REGIONAL Gov. Ned Lamont and state Education Commissioner Charlene Russell-Tucker announced last week that Connecticut will offer free breakfast to all schoolchildren in Connecticut and make lunch free for students who previously qualified for reducedprice lunches.

With this announcement, Connecticut became the seventh state to institute free school meals, with Mas- sachusetts joining the ranks as number eight on Aug. 10.

To make the program possible, Connecticut allocated $16 million from funding the state received under the America Rescue Plan Act. During the pandemic, both breakfast and lunch were free for students in Connecticut thanks to federal funding, but this ended when the pandemic program expired.

“There is no curriculum brilliant enough to compensate for a hungry stomach or a distracted mind,” RussellTucker said at a press conference. “Our students’ physical, mental, social and emotional health and wellness are foundational to learning. Therefore, providing healthy meals without financial stigmas is a strategic investment in fueling students’ growth and educational outcomes.”

This expansion means the participation of approximately 114 districts and the eligibility of an estimated

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For this reporter, it was late June last year when I found my first monarch caterpillar of the season on a milkweed leaf at my home. This year, I encountered no monarch caterpillars, up until recently.

On Aug. 10, I finally saw a monarch butterfly.

Ron Gagliardi, CT Butterfly Association’s Outreach Educator, saw a monarch in West Haven on Aug. 3, but had not noticed any in Cheshire, where he lives, as of the first week in August. “That was my first one this season,” he said.

Monarch populations have been hard hit on both coasts. Myriad sources are responsible, including pesticide use, said Gagliardi. Fragmentation and the re- sulting lack of host plants and nectar sites normally found in open areas and meadows are also contributing factors.

Gagliardi recalls Xerces Society’s Executive Director Scott Black’s comment on the monarch population's decline, as “death by a thousand cuts.”

“From what I’ve seen, we’re seeing a decline in all butterfly populations,” said Gagliardi. He also points to annual studies done by Connecticut lepidopterist Victor Masi in his hometown of Redding. Gagliardi said there was a year when Masi did not record a single monarch.

“They’re being seen – not in big numbers, but both caterpillars and adults are being reported,” said CT Butterfly Association founder John Himmelman. That was back on July 10. Is it possible that not seeing monarchs locally at

See Butterfly, A8