COLORADO SPRINGS, COLO. -- Colorado lawmakers facing a gaping budget deficit have decided to end free breakfasts for needy children funded by the state Department of Education.
It's called the Start Smart Nutrition Program, and Colorado lawmakers voted Thursday to stop funding it. Now parents with kids on the program may be forced to come up with the cash.
For every student that received a free or reduced breakfast, 30 cents was given to the school by the State Department of Education.
School officials said while it doesn't sound like a lot of money, school districts will lose thousands, and it's the children who may suffer.
Nutrition experts said breakfast is the most important meal of the day, and now some children in Colorado may have to go without it.
"It kind of kick-starts the body," Rick Hughes, D11 Director of Food & Nutrition Services, said. " It kind of kick-starts your brain, so if we want kids to do better in the classroom, they have to have their tummies full."
Colorado lawmakers trying to end a budget deficit voted not to continue funding the Start Smart Nutrition Program, which will save them around $125,000 and cost school districts thousands.
"If we did nothing and absorbed this, it would be a $26,000 hit to our budget," Hughes said.
Now local school districts are trying to find other ways to make up for the loss.
"Currently we haven't zeroed in onto the answer on how to answer this problem," Hughes said "We're looking at possibly corporate sponsorships, maybe finding either a local company or a national organization to help us."
School officials said one option would be having students who are on reduced meals start paying for breakfast, but they said they don't want to have to do that.
"There's a lot of families in this community who rely on the District 11 breakfast and lunch program to provide nutritional foods for their children everyday," Hughes said. "So this can have an impact on our community, and it's important that we serve those children."
Right now breakfast is the only meal that is being affected, lunches are not at this time. But experts said starting the school day without breakfast puts students at a disadvantage.
"It's how they feed their brains, how they start their minds in the morning so that they can concentrate on their school work," Hughes said.
A District 2 spokesperson said the decision to end funding won't effect their students, and they will be able to cover the loss.
Other districts said no final decisions have been made at this point, and up until April breakfast will continue to be free for students that qualify for it.
The breakfast program serves about 2.3 million breakfasts a year to about 56,000 eligible children.
------
Information from: The Denver Post
TV Station Profiles & Public Inspection Files forKXRM