In Tuesday’s election, Colorado voters cast their ballots on two statewide propositions that deal with funding for the state’s Healthy School Meals for All program, which voters approved in 2022. The program is experiencing higher costs due to the program’s unanticipated popularity, state budget officials say.
One of the two propositions, LL, decides how the state manages $12.4 million in tax revenue raised by a previous proposition, along with the interest on that money.
On Wednesday morning, the Colorado Secretary of State’s Office listed the vote results as 65% approved with 919,372 votes and 35% rejected with 502,512 votes. There were still about 26,000 ballots that needed to be counted but that spread was too big for those who voted against it to make up the difference.
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That money will now go to the program after the vote. Had it failed, the money would have gone back to taxpayers who have a combined household income of $300,000 or more.
CBS Colorado’s political analysts weren’t surprised by the outcome on Tuesday.
“It’s at the forefront of people’s minds: food insecurity is a big deal. Also, food inflation and the affordability of it,” CBS Colorado Democratic analyst Mike Dino said. “Inflation for groceries … has not subsided. And I do think that people appreciate the fact that students will have access to food for breakfast and lunch.”
“Yes, it sounds great: school kids getting fed lunch and breakfast. That’s just wonderful. We’re all in favor of that. But government cannot do everything,” said CBS Colorado Republican analyst Dick Wadhams. “And so when we’re back here at this desk, presumably two years from now or four years from now, talking about the same issue and how (state legislators) underestimated the cost of it? Here we go again.”
