Linda Griffin was aghast when she realized her grocery bill had increased $620 per day since last year.

She knew she would have to find more money to feed about 6,000 children.

Not her children but the thousands of Limestone County students who take hot lunches at school each day.

“The price of fuel and the price of food have driven up the cost that much,” said Griffin, director of the Limestone County Schools Child Nutrition Program, which provides meals daily for students, staff and occasional visitors.

Griffin knew county schools had two options – raise the price of school lunches or find the money in the general fund to cover the shortfall. With city and county schools bracing for cuts in the state education budget, finding extra money in the general fund was unlikely.

So, school board members voted unanimously Monday to raise by a quarter the cost of lunches for students in fourth through 12th grades for the 2008-2009 school year.

Students in fourth through sixth grades will pay $2 per lunch, up from $1.75 this year.

Students in seventh through 12th grades will pay $2.25 per lunch, up from $2 this year.

Prices for students in kindergarten through third grade will remain the same at $1.75 per meal. Reduced-price lunches will remain at 40 cents for students who qualify. Breakfast prices will also remain the same. Griffin doesn’t know yet about ala carte food.

“That bid is done in the summer, so we don’t know the cost now,” she said.

The increase means parents will pay $45 more per child per year for school lunches, assuming the child eats lunch each of the 180 school days.

“If you have more than one, that’s where it gets difficult,” Griffin said.

Like the rest of the nation, Limestone County Schools is seeing the cost of food rising in tandem with rising fuel costs.

“Groceries cost more, mainly due to rising fuel costs, and it costs more to transport the food here,” Griffin explained. “We really don’t buy food locally, it is trucked in.”

At $2.25 or less, school lunches are still a bargain.