Changes to the Miami Trace Local Schools’ food service program will take effect next week as Ohio begins to abide by the Ohio Department of Health Director Dr. Amy Acton’s “Stay-at-home” order to limit the spread of COVID-19.

“We made some changes to try and limit the exposure and the number of people needed for prep, so we moved the program to one day a week prep and one day of delivery,” Miami Trace Superintendent David Lewis said.

According to Lewis, the changes include a drop from three delivery days per week to only one on Tuesday, following this week. Lewis explained the district will use Monday as its time to prepare the meals for the week, and then on delivery day each student will receive five days worth of breakfasts and lunches at one time. Additionally, Lewis said the district is using pre-packaged items only in the meals to ensure minimal contact with the food has been made before it is distributed into the community.

Students around the state are currently learning from home due to the coronavirus.

“That is starting next Monday (March 30),” Lewis said. “We are going to go ahead and do Wednesday as well this week, but once we start on March 30 they will get five days worth of those meals on delivery day (Tuesday, March 31 and onward). We were doing eight different locations, but we are just trying to limit the exposure and people interacting. We are trying to keep everyone safe and happy but at the same time trying to take care of our students and make sure they have the meals they need. Everybody stay patient and work together and we will get through this.”

The following locations will be used for Miami Trace meal deliveries; Jeffersonville (Shelter House) from 11-11:30 a.m., Bloomingburg (Dollar General Parking Lot) from 12-12:30 p.m., Pine Tree Apartments (JoAnn Drive) from 11-11:15 a.m., New Holland (Fire Department) from 11-11:30 a.m., Good Hope Church from 12-12:30 p.m., Miami Trace Stadium Parking Lot (pick up by concession stand area) from 11-11:30 a.m., Staunton Ball Fields from 12-12:30 p.m. and Rawling Street and Delaware Street in Washington Court House (Old Carlton Manor) from 11:30 a.m.-12 p.m.

For Washington Court House City Schools (WCHCS), there will be no changes moving forward as they continue to feed the district’s students, according to director of marketing and communication Trevor Patton.

“The Big Blue Bus is good to go,” Patton said Monday. “As soon as Governor DeWine mentioned Dr. Acton’s order, the first phone call we made was to the director of public health for Fayette County. We have been in communication with her this whole time with our standards, keeping things clean and screening the volunteers, but she said we are good to go. So the Big Blue Bus will be on the road and was on the road (Monday) with over 2,400 meals served, and we plan to do the same thing until further notice.”

Patton said a big part of this process is ensuring all of the staff and volunteers go through a thorough screening as soon as they hit campus. He said they gather those people who are then sanitized, checked for a fever and further screened, according to Center for Disease Control (CDC) standards.

“If they have a temperature or if they answer ‘yes’ to any of the CDC questions, then we send them home,” Patton said. “Feeding kids is absolutely the main effort, but our top priority is still the health and well-being of our staff and volunteers, as well as the students that we interact with when we travel around town. We are still on though and we have rigorous screening programs to make sure we are not sending any sick folks out into the community. We will continue on with the Big Blue Bus though as we try and feed the kids of Fayette County.”

The information in this article was provided by WCHCS Director of Marketing and Communication Trevor Patton and Miami Trace Local Schools Superintendent David Lewis. Stay with the Record-Herald for more updates from the local school districts in a future edition of the paper and online at www.recordherald.com.

Reach Martin Graham at (740) 313-0351 or on Twitter @MartiTheNewsGuy.