I've notice sweet potato vine growing where they were

planted last year. Does anyone know if they might turn into viable tubers for
consumption? Quick internet search doesn't yield that info. Thanks

No reason at all they shouldn't make edible tubers this year off the new growth, as long as the growing conditions are right.

So I saw sweet potato vine at Lowe's and asked, does this actually produce sweet potatoes, and got told no... Is there an ornamental or was the lady misinformed? The people there actually generally seem to know something about gardening, contrary to what I expected.

All of the "ornamental" sweet potato vines are just varieties of regular sweet potatoes that were found and propagated (sports or mutations) or bred (some of the more recent ones) as ornamentals. But, they can all produce edible tubers, although the more highly colored ones (the ones that are pink and white shades along with green, like 'Tricolor) tend to be relatively weak growers that don't produce very large tubers or many of them.

A couple of the more popular varieties such as 'Blackie' actually were introduced as vegetables back in the 1960s and 1970s and were later adapted as ornamentals.

They may bear tubers with orange, yellow, white, or even purple flesh, depending upon variety. All perfectly edible.