---
type: "Bill"
title: "School meals; adoption of policies."
description: "School meal policies. Requires each localschool board to adopt policies that prohibit school board employeesfrom requiring a student who cannot pay for a meal at school or whoowes a school meal debt to throw away or discard a meal after ithas been served to him."
jurisdiction: "us/states/va"
legislature: "Virginia General Assembly"
session: "2020"
identifier: "HB 697"
citation: "Virginia HB 697 (2020)"
classification: ["bill"]
subjects: []
status: "enacted"
primary_sponsors: ["Danica A. Roem"]
version_count: 3
action_count: 26
vote_count: 6
first_action: "2020-01-06"
last_action: "2020-03-27"
source: "openstates"
source_identifier: "ocd-bill/34ff5ee4-d720-46b4-a3c5-f33888f675b5"
source_url: "https://lis.virginia.gov/cgi-bin/legp604.exe?201+sum+HB697"
source_hash: "284ff6e5a874e4cbc1e7248bb8058c417d2e23e5cdc813b6a0ee9933155c08cf"
vintage: "2026-07-01"
source_snapshot: "https://data.openstates.org/daily/2026-07-01/public.pgdump"
retrieved_at: "2026-07-06"
confidence: "reported"
tags: ["legislation", "bill", "us-va"]
---

# Virginia HB 697 (2020) — School meals; adoption of policies.

School meal policies. Requires each localschool board to adopt policies that prohibit school board employeesfrom requiring a student who cannot pay for a meal at school or whoowes a school meal debt to throw away or discard a meal after ithas been served to him.

## Version chain

The bill's text revisions, in order — the diff chain from filing to enrollment.

1. **Acts of Assembly Chapter text (CHAP0509)** (committee substitute) — [source](https://lis.virginia.gov/cgi-bin/legp604.exe?201+ful+CHAP0509)
2. **Bill text as passed House and Senate (HB697ER)** (committee substitute) — [source](https://lis.virginia.gov/cgi-bin/legp604.exe?201+ful+HB697ER)
3. **Impact statement from DPB (HB697)** (committee substitute) — [source](https://lis.virginia.gov/cgi-bin/legp604.exe?201+ful+HB697)

## Votes

- VOTE: Passage (94-Y 6-N) — **93–6** (pass) · lower
- Subcommittee recommends reporting (7-Y 1-N) — **7–1** (pass) · lower
- Constitutional reading dispensed (37-Y 0-N) — **37–0** (pass) · upper
- Reported from Education and Health (15-Y 0-N) — **15–0** (pass) · upper
- Passed Senate (40-Y 0-N) — **40–0** (pass) · upper
- Reported from Education (17-Y 1-N) — **17–1** (pass) · lower

## Sponsors

- Danica A. Roem — primary (person)
- Alfonso H. Lopez — cosponsor (person)
- Glenn R. Davis — cosponsor (person)
- Hala S. Ayala — cosponsor (person)
- Ibraheem S. Samirah — cosponsor (person)
- Karrie K. Delaney — cosponsor (person)
- Kaye Kory — cosponsor (person)
- Lamont Bagby — cosponsor (person)
- Mark H. Levine — cosponsor (person)
- Mark L. Keam — cosponsor (person)
- Patrick A. Hope — cosponsor (person)
- R. Lee Ware — cosponsor (person)
- Sam Rasoul — cosponsor (person)
- Suhas Subramanyam — cosponsor (person)

## Timeline

The legislative action history — every referral, reading, and vote.

- **2020-01-06** Prefiled and ordered printed; offered 01/08/20 20100887D `introduction`
- **2020-01-06** Referred to Committee on Education `referral-committee`
- **2020-01-13** Assigned Education sub: Pre-K-12 `referral-committee`
- **2020-01-16** Impact statement from DPB (HB697)
- **2020-01-29** Subcommittee recommends reporting (7-Y 1-N)
- **2020-02-03** Reported from Education (17-Y 1-N) `committee-passage`
- **2020-02-05** Read first time `reading-1`
- **2020-02-06** Read second time and engrossed `reading-2`
- **2020-02-07** Read third time and passed House (94-Y 6-N) `passage, reading-3`
- **2020-02-07** VOTE: Passage (94-Y 6-N)
- **2020-02-10** Constitutional reading dispensed
- **2020-02-10** Referred to Committee on Education and Health `referral-committee`
- **2020-02-18** Assigned Education sub: Public Education `referral-committee`
- **2020-02-27** Reported from Education and Health (15-Y 0-N) `committee-passage`
- **2020-02-28** Constitutional reading dispensed (37-Y 0-N)
- **2020-03-02** Read third time `reading-3`
- **2020-03-02** Passed by for the day
- **2020-03-03** Read third time `reading-3`
- **2020-03-03** Passed Senate (40-Y 0-N) `passage`
- **2020-03-06** Enrolled
- **2020-03-06** Impact statement from DPB (HB697ER)
- **2020-03-06** Signed by Speaker
- **2020-03-06** Signed by President
- **2020-03-12** Enrolled Bill communicated to Governor on March 12, 2020
- **2020-03-12** Governor's Action Deadline 11:59 p.m., April 11, 2020
- **2020-03-27** Approved by Governor-Chapter 509 (effective 7/1/20) `executive-signature`

## Source

OpenStates / OpenCivicData bulk snapshot [2026-07-01](https://data.openstates.org/daily/2026-07-01/public.pgdump); origin `ocd-bill/34ff5ee4-d720-46b4-a3c5-f33888f675b5`. Confidence: reported (aggregated from official Virginia legislature records).