Pettersen, advocates push for more funding for free school meals

DENVER ( KDVR ) — Two years ago Colorado voters approved a ballot question, ensuring school districts could provide free breakfast and lunch to all students in public schools who want to participate in the Healthy Meals for All program.

Now, money for the program is running low. Local and federal leaders got a firsthand look at the program and talked about how they can fill the gap.

Families across the state are utilizing the state’s free meal program for school districts but money for the program is running lower than leaders expected.

“In JeffCo, we’ve seen an increase of about 40% at lunch. And even more at breakfast time,” said Erika Edwards.

She is the director of operations for food nutrition services at Jefferson County Schools. Edwards said the district has distributed 10,000 more breakfast and lunch meals per day since the state made the meals available for everyone; saying the district would serve around 35,000 breakfast and lunch meals on a good day prior to the 2023-2024 school year. Now the district averages around 45,000 breakfast and lunch meals a day.

“There are more and more students participating that had not participated prior. The state is then needing to cover the cost of those meals,” Edwards said.

Right now, school districts use federal money to provide free breakfast and lunch to those who meet federal requirements and state money for everyone else. State money for the program is running low.

“Changing some things in the Community Eligibility Provision is something we are talking about today. That would need to be changed at the federal level to then increase the number of student meals who are being reimbursed by the federal government rather than the state government,” Edwards said.

Former state representative and now Congresswoman Brittany Pettersen sponsored the original effort to get the question to voters. She stopped at a school in Jefferson County to see how the program is going and push for more help and fewer cuts from the federal government.

“Definitely [need] some adjustments at the state level. They have a couple of options like going back to the ballot. But also at the federal level we need to be supporting programs like this nationwide. So, supplementing some of these pilot programs to help support innovative ideas to show what works and what doesn’t and then trying to build off of that,” Pettersen said.

She said that nutrition programs at the federal level have been on the chopping block in the Farm Bill that Congress has not yet passed.

“We don’t know exactly what the next makeup of Congress is going to look like after November. But I can tell you that Democrats led on trying to fight for this nationwide. During COVID we did actually fund school meals for all,” Pettersen said. “It really helped families with rising costs, it really helps kids focus in school and do better and it reduces the stigma for kids who rely on a reduced and free school lunch program. That’s something I hope we get passed nationwide.”

Universal free school meals have been a topic in the race for the White House. The U.S. Department of Agriculture issued waivers to make school lunch free in 2020 under former President Donald Trump before it expired in 2022.

Minnesota Governor and Democratic candidate for Vice President Tim Walz signed a bill to make the program permanent in that state last year. The text of Project 2025 proposes eventually working to get rid of Community Eligibility Provision. Trump has denied having any involvement with Project 2025 but has close political ties to the writers of the controversial plan.

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