D.J. Bracken has been paying off Utah kids’ school lunch debt with his own money. He had learned about the $2.8 million statewide tab in 2024, and couldn’t imagine his 7-year-old daughter going hungry or accumulating debt just to eat lunch.
Bracken created the Utah Lunch Debt Relief foundation to help. But it’s just gotten worse — school lunch debt in Utah surpassed $3.6 million in 2025, a 31% increase from 2024 and a 90% rise since 2023, according to data gathered by FOX13.
Now he has a new idea. He’s offering to pay for license plates for 500 Utahns, funding their preorders so his foundation can apply for a special group license plate to raise money for lunch debt.
“Theoretically, if we get enough people across the state,…