LANSING, Mich. (Michigan News Source) – When the state of Michigan decided to give free lunches to all students, the Michigan Department of Education (MDE) estimated it would cost about $160 million extra a year.

But there are other related costs to providing meals to school children.

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For example, Detroit Public Schools Community District pays about $48 million a year for its food service, with about 95% of that covered by federal funding.

The school board was set to approve a $21 million contract with a private vendor US Foods, Inc. to provide deliveries and storage of its food. The district said some school buildings require up to five food deliveries a week.

The district has 150 school kitchens and serves about 55,000 meals a day.

In late January, President Donald Trump froze all federal funding for two days to review them, which set off a panic among Michigan school administrators.

“How does ‘pausing’ federal funding for school meals for disadvantaged children or programming for special needs children make America great again? If the agenda is to add ‘accountability’ to these programs … fine. Then work with Congress and change things. Don’t create chaos,” Detroit Public Schools Community District Superintendent Nikolai Vitti posted on X in late January.

Overall, the state of Michigan spent $200 million providing free lunches to K-12 students. That paid for more than 76.3 million breakfasts and 135.6 million lunches.