Benevento's school canteen service is going through a difficult organisational phase, and a city councillor has put forward a community-based stopgap: let children bring lunch from home, supervised with help from volunteers and so-called civic grandparents.
The proposal comes from Angelo Moretti, municipal councillor for Civico 22. According to reporting by NTR24, Moretti proposes allowing children to bring meals prepared at home, with responsibilities shared between families and school institutions, while volunteers and "nonni civici" help supervise the spaces where those children would eat.
Civico 22 says it is available to coordinate the volunteers. Moretti has appealed to school heads to authorise the support through strict protocols.
What is being proposed
The proposal has two practical elements:
- Permission for packed lunches: children could bring food prepared at home as an alternative while the municipal canteen service is being stabilised.
- Supervised spaces: "nonni civici" and other volunteers would help oversee the rooms used by children eating lunch from home.
Civico 22 frames the idea as a response to social cohesion: keeping younger children together at school during the lunch period rather than leaving families without a workable midday arrangement. The group asks school leaders to enable the volunteer presence through formal, rigorous protocols.
What has not been established is whether any school has adopted or authorised packed lunches under this formula. The operational protocols, legal requirements, and insurance coverage for volunteers were not detailed in the material reviewed.
The context: planned restart on 14 October
The proposal follows an announced restart date for school catering in Benevento. The municipality said the service could begin on Wednesday, 14 October 2026, thanks to temporary use of the kitchens of the Nicola Sala Conservatory in Via dei Mulini.
A joint note from Mayor Clemente Mastella and Education delegate Marcello Palladino, reported on 12 October, indicated the same date and the same temporary kitchen solution. It has not been confirmed from the sources reviewed whether the service actually started on 14 October under the announced conditions.
What readers should keep in mind
This remains a political proposal attributed to Moretti and Civico 22, not a verified decision by schools or the municipality. Statements about the causes of the disruption and related political responsibility remain attributions to the councillor rather than independently verified facts.
For families, the useful distinction is this: the municipal plan points to central kitchens at the Conservatory as the temporary route to restarting the regular service, while the Civico 22 proposal points to a parallel, school-by-school option — home-packed meals with volunteer supervision — that would require explicit authorisation by each school head.
Until individual schools communicate otherwise, parents should treat packed lunches with volunteer supervision as a proposal under discussion, not as an approved arrangement.
