Appeal panel backs disqualification of St. Paul nonprofit that sponsored food sites where fraud is alleged

Josh Verges, Pioneer Press
·2 min read

The Minnesota Department of Education’s appeal panel has upheld the department’s May decision to terminate a St. Paul nonprofit’s participation in a federal food program at the center of the alleged $250 million fraud.

No one at Partners in Nutrition, which sponsors sites that hand out free food for children, has been charged criminally. However, some of the sponsor’s clients are among the 50 people charged in federal court.

The Department of Education informed the nonprofit in May that it was terminating Partners in Nutrition’s participation in the Child and Adult Care Food Program and cutting off reimbursements.

Partners in Nutrition challenged that decision, but the department’s own appeal panel — led by Deputy Commissioner Stephanie Burrage — concluded the federal grants regulation that the department relied on for its action does apply to the food program.

The panel also noted that Partners in Nutrition’s program contract gives the department the power to withhold payments if the food sponsor, whether knowingly or not, fails to submit accurate claims.

According to the decision, Partners in Nutrition still maintains that its claims from summer 2021, which sought reimbursement for feeding 600,000 children, were legitimate. And if any fraud did take place, the nonprofit said, it was “not a knowing participant.”

The appeal panel said that even if Partners in Nutrition did not knowingly participate in fraud, the nonprofit was responsible for providing the kind of oversight that would have prevented it from taking place.

The alleged fraud, the panel wrote, reflects Partners in Nutrition’s “organizational-level failure to properly fulfill its role as a CACFP sponsor.”

Even though Partners in Nutrition no longer can seek reimbursement for meals, its individual clients can pursue claims with the department directly.

Partners in Nutrition still is fighting in two other arenas for its ability to participate in the food program. One decision is pending before the state Court of Appeals, and the nonprofit last month sued the department in federal court.

Partners in Nutrition was one of Minnesota’s major players in child nutrition, claiming $179 million in meal reimbursements last year alone, after the federal government loosened regulations in order to get more kids fed during the coronavirus pandemic. The organization was founded by Aimee Bock, who went on to start the competing Feeding Our Future, which claimed $198 million in reimbursements last year.

Federal prosecutors say Bock was at the center of a fraud scheme involving false meal claims and kickbacks. She has pleaded not guilty to conspiring to commit fraud and bribery.

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