WASHINGTON – Colorado’s new free school meals program will face a key test when voters decide two statewide ballot measures that would put the program on sounder financial footing, mostly by raising taxes on high-income individuals.
The outcome of the measures in the Nov. 4 election will determine whether the “Healthy School Meals for All” program will continue to provide free breakfast and lunch for all Colorado public school students or be scaled back significantly.
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Approved by voters in 2022, the program was originally projected to cost about $115 million in its first year but ended up costing about $162 million because of higher-than-expected participation, according to a December 2024 report by the Colorado Department of Education.
Proposition MM would increase free school meal funding by placing a lower cap on tax deductions for individuals who make $300,000 or more a year. The move would affect roughly 194,000 Colorado taxpayers in 2026 with an average tax increase of about $385 for single filers and about $570 for those filing jointly, according to an analysis by the Colorado General Assembly’s nonpartisan legislative research office.
The second measure, Proposition LL, would authorize “Healthy School Meals for All” to use about $12 million in tax dollars already collected for the program but slated to be refunded to taxpayers. Under the state’s Taxpayer Bill of Rights law, or TABOR, any surplus taxes collected must be refunded to taxpayers, and the state must ask voters for permission to keep and spend excess tax funds.
If both measures pass, the meals program is expected to have access to an additional $65 million for the remainder of the 2025-26 academic year and about $119 million for the following year.
The 2022 proposition authorizing “Healthy School Meals for All” passed with about 57% of voters in favor and 43% voting against. A majority of voters in 34 of the state’s 64 counties supported the measure. A slim majority of voters approved of the measure in El Paso County, the state’s most populous, while the four next largest counties of Denver, Arapahoe, Jefferson and Adams supported the measure by much wider margins.
In November 2023, Colorado voters addressed two unrelated measures that also would have affected how the state deals with excess tax revenue. About 59% of voters rejected Proposition HH, which would have gradually decreased the amount of TABOR tax refunds taxpayers would receive in exchange for lower property tax rates. At the same time, nearly 68% of voters approved Proposition II, which allowed the state to keep $23.7 million in excess tobacco and nicotine taxes and direct the money to the state’s universal preschool program.
The strongest opposition to tax-related propositions over the years has come from traditionally Republican-voting areas, while the strongest support has been in more Democratic-voting areas.
In the 2022 school meals proposition, voters in counties that President Donald Trump carried in 2024 collectively opposed the measure, with about 52% voting against. Voters in Harris-supporting counties backed the school meals measure with 62% of the vote.
Colorado is one of nine states that provides free meals to all public school students regardless of income.
The Associated Press does not make projections and will declare a winner only when it’s determined there is no scenario that would allow the trailing candidates to close the gap. If a race has not been called, the AP will continue to cover any newsworthy developments, such as candidate concessions or declarations of victory. In doing so, the AP will make clear that it has not yet declared a winner and explain why.
In Colorado, an automatic recount is triggered if the margin between the top two vote-getters is 0.5% or less of the leading candidate’s vote total. The AP may declare a winner in a race that is eligible for a recount if it can determine the lead is too large for a recount or legal challenge to change the outcome.
Here’s a look at what to expect in the Nov. 4 election:
Election Day
Colorado’s vote on Propositions LL and MM will be held Tuesday. Polls close statewide at 7 p.m. local time, which is 9 p.m. ET.
What’s on the ballot
The AP will provide vote results and declare winners in both statewide ballot measures.
Who gets to vote
Any voter registered in Colorado may participate in the general election.
What do turnout and advance vote look like
As of Oct 3, there were about 4.5 million registered voters in Colorado. Of those, about 25% were Democrats, 22% were Republicans and slightly more than 50% were not affiliated with any party. The remainder were registered with other parties.
In Nov. 2023, the last Colorado general election when two propositions were the only contests on the statewide ballot, just shy of 1.7 million voters cast ballots on the measures, about 39% of registered voters. Colorado holds its elections predominantly by mail.
As of Thursday, nearly 355,000 ballots had already been cast before Election Day, about 30% from Republicans, about 28% from Democrats and about 40% from voters not affiliated with any party. See the AP Early Vote Tracker for the latest update.
How long does vote counting usually take?
In the 2024 presidential election, the AP first reported results in Colorado at 9:05 p.m. ET, or five minutes after polls closed. The vote tabulation ended for the night at 5:35 a.m. ET with about 79% of total votes counted.
The vote count was reported at a similar pace for the two Nov. 2023 statewide ballot measures. The first votes were reported at 9:03 p.m. ET, while the final update of the night was at 6:21 a.m. ET with about 85% of the vote counted.
Are we there yet?
As of the Nov. 4 election, there will be 364 days until the 2026 midterm elections and 1,099 days until the 2028 general election.
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Follow the AP’s coverage of the 2025 election at https://apnews.com/projects/election-results-2025/.