East Lyme schools to soon hire new director for food service program
East Lyme — The school district plans to operate its own food service program for the upcoming 2017-18 school year and is expected to soon hire a director to oversee the program.
The Board of Education is slated to interview the finalist for the position in executive session on Monday and potentially appoint the director during Monday's regular meeting.
The school board had voted last week to move from Chartwells to the district's own food service program for the upcoming school year.
"With our own program, we should be able to better control costs and provide better quality food to our students," Superintendent Jeffrey Newton said in a phone interview.
He added that the district's self-operated food service also will allow for more catering opportunities — for example, to provide meals to members of the schools' sports teams while traveling — and collaboration with local vendors.
"We feel we can work a lot more closely with the local community, with the local farms that are around, to get some fresh fruit and vegetables and build some partnerships across the community," Newton said.
He said the district plans to hire back the Chartwells' cooks and food service workers that worked in East Lyme schools.
Chartwells did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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