Our opinion: The time has come for free school meals for all in North Dakota

A poll by the North Dakota News Cooperative shows 82% of respondents in favor of providing free school meals to all children. Of those, 65% are “strongly in favor.”

With that kind of support, perhaps North Dakota’s Legislature will this year move forward with a plan to provide free lunches for all school children in the state, ensuring healthy and ample meals for all while ridding school lunchrooms of the terrible stigma that attaches itself to those children whose families struggle or refuse to make payments for the meals their children eat.

Minnesota has provided a roadmap. In 2023, Gov. Tim Walz signed a bill that calls for free breakfasts and lunches at schools across the state for all children, regardless of family income and ability to pay. It came as the state was seeing historically high demand at food shelves, according to a report by Minnesota Public Radio. The news agency quoted Leah Gardner, of Hunger Solutions Minnesota, who said “we are still seeing tremendous food insecurity across the state” as food prices continue to rise.

According to Forum News Service reporting last month, North Dakota food banks also are seeing high participation in food aid services. In 2023, for instance, more than 156,000 North Dakotans relied on the Great Plains Food Bank to supplement their nutrition.

Free meals improve the nutrition of all students. North Dakota United – which represents educators throughout the state – points to research that shows students who participate in free food programs have better attendance, behavior, academic performance and achievement.

A free-for-all-students program also changes how students view each other in the lunchroom. For instance, when free meals were offered in Minnesota during the COVID-19 pandemic, “it made it feel like an equal playing field,” Gardner told MPR. “It made all the stigma go away.”

In North Dakota, progress was made in 2023. Lawmakers approved legislation that pays for meals for students of low-income parents and guardians. The final bill was a skeleton of its original form, however. It had been introduced as a measure to provide free meals for all students.

Indeed, free lunches come with a cost. In North Dakota, the program to provide meals for low-income students is some $6 million per biennium. And in more densely populated Minnesota, the free-for-all-students approach is proving more costly than anticipated; it was budgeted at $400 million over two years, but it looks like it’ll be $80 million more than that.

For some lawmakers, the cost for the state is worth it, since it bolsters school learning and attendance while reducing costs for families. Sen. Zac Ista, D-Grand Forks, is among them.

“The top issue heading into the 2025 legislative session is lowering the cost of living. Across North Dakota, families continue to feel the pinch of high costs for essentials like food, child care and housing. As state policymakers, we must continue to make strategic investments and policy choices to bring down these costs,” Ista said. “To tackle food costs, one solution is to provide no-cost school meals for all K-12 students in the state, providing a substantial cost savings for families with schoolchildren and also leading to better educational and behavioral outcomes in classrooms.”

Ista isn’t alone, evidenced by the North Dakota News Cooperative poll and news that 30 organizations in the state are coming together to support a free-meal program. Called “Together for School Meals,” the coalition plans to recommend $140 million in state funding over the coming biennium to reimburse schools for the costs of free meals for all students.

North Dakota can afford this, and making the meals free for all is fair for everybody. Lawmakers should make it happen in 2025.

Herald editorials are written under the byline “Herald editorial board,” since they sometimes include the thoughts, opinions or written input of multiple authors. Editorials generally reflect the opinion of a newspaper’s publisher.