Charlene Huskey
Word on the Street

I took a walk around the Mesa State campus. As I viewed all of the students, I noticed how diverse our school truly is. We are not a separation, but a group with many different beliefs and viewpoints. Those viewpoints also include political issues. I decided to test how much we all differ in opinion. I asked four students how they felt about the possibility of taxes being raised on soda and candy in Colorado.
Patrick Steeler, an undeclared freshmen, had some rather strong opinions about how much he disagrees with Colorado possibly raising the candy and soda tax. He said, “I think it’s wrong, it’s completely unnecessary to tax on the little things. Before too long it’s going to be where everything is taxed. There are so many other ways to raise money in order to get our country or our state out of this budget hole.”
Although Patrick could not think of any solutions off the top of his head, he felt strong about the situation. Patrick wasn’t the only student I found that was frustrated with the suggestion of raising taxes on sweets. Two freshmen kinesiology majors, Sammy Bright, and Danielle Shabelsky, found it exasperating to have the tax increase even mentioned. Bright said, “I’m a kinesiology major; so I like to work out a lot. Candy and pop aren’t exactly in my diet. Although I can understand why it would make most people pretty irritated; especially college students.”
Her fellow kinesiology friend, Shabelsky, felt the same way saying, “College students are already broke enough, and you know that it’s really going to hit us the hardest. Every class you go to, there are at least three people that have a pop or something sweet in their hands.”
Jericho Hankins, a sophomore with an undeclared major, differed from everyone else.  He didn’t completely agree with the situation, but he had more of an optimistic view. “I can understand everyone’s different opinions, but they’re not looking at the whole picture. This can really help out our situation with the budget hole. Not only will this allow our state to get financial help, but think of the health issues this could solve. I do doubt that people won’t stop buying candy or pop, but it might persuade them to think otherwise. People have such an easy access to an unhealthy life, maybe it’s not a bad thing to make that entrance more complicated to get to,” he said.
I believe that our economy is not in a place to increase taxes. There are other solutions to solving the budget hole that we are in. After listening to all of the other students, I decided that bringing back the candy and soda tax will actually put more people out of the job; especially in the industry’s market. If we were in another time, where our country was more stable, I wouldn’t think that this tax increase would be such a bad idea. Especially after listening to Mr. Hankins’ thoughts on how this may decrease obesity in our nation, or just in the state of Colorado. Our state is definitely suffering from health issues; hopefully this will help the condition.

chuskey@mesastate.edu