Byron Donalds today announced Healthy Florida Healthy Families – a common sense plan to get ultra-processed food, artificial dyes, and harmful additives out of Florida school meals and to guarantee every Florida child access to clean, tested water at school and at home.
Florida schools currently follow federal USDA meal standards, but no state law restricts ultra-processed ingredients or dyes, and loopholes still let processed snacks and vending items onto campus. Florida also has no mandatory lead or contaminant testing law for schools, and testing today is voluntary, with most districts opting out.
Under Donalds’ plan, the state would remove ultra-processed foods and additives from school meals, close the loopholes letting soda and candy onto campus, and require every district to post menus and ingredients online.
The plan scales up Florida’s existing Farm to School program, connecting Florida farmers directly to Florida cafeterias, with a dedicated appropriation to build the supply chain clean food standards need.
“When a kid sits down in a cafeteria, parents want to know what’s on that tray. When they fill a cup at the fountain, we want to know what’s in that water,” said Byron Donalds. “Florida doesn’t have to wait on Washington to catch up. We already grow the food and we already have the farmers ready to supply it. This isn’t radical, it’s what every parent expects at their own kitchen table, and it’s what Florida is going to deliver to every Florida student.”
The plan also requires testing in every Florida school for lead and contaminants, post results publicly, and requiring fixes wherever unsafe levels are found. It prioritizes free or subsidized testing and remediation for families with young children on private wells, and aligns Florida’s testing panel with the EPA’s April 2026 draft Sixth Contaminant Candidate List, which for the first time designates microplastics and pharmaceuticals as priority contaminants alongside PFAS.
Healthy Florida Healthy Families pairs Florida’s farm-to-cafeteria supply chain with new testing and transparency requirements so parents can know what their children are eating and drinking every day, at school and at home. The plan reflects Donalds’ commitment to Florida’s farmers and agriculture producers, putting them at the center of the state’s efforts build a Healthy Florida.
