Latest news with #EmergencyFoodAssistanceProgram
The Hill
5 days ago
- Business
- The Hill
Federal food aid cuts will cause America's hunger crisis to skyrocket
The Daily Table, one of the largest food banks in Boston, recently announced it was closing its doors after serving more than 3 million people throughout the city over the past decade. The organization cited high food prices and an 'uncertain funding environment' as the main reasons. 'Without immediate funding to bridge us through 2025, we cannot continue,' read the group's farewell note to supporters. Pantries like the Daily Table across the country are struggling to stay open after the U.S. Department of Agriculture quietly cut $1 billion in 2025 funding back in March for food relief programs that have historically supported the nation's most disadvantaged communities. Specifically, the USDA abruptly slashed the Emergency Food Assistance Program, which supported food banks in addressing the growing hunger crisis in America. The agency also canceled the Local Food for Schools Cooperative Agreement and the Local Food Purchase Assistance Program, USDA-led initiatives that paid farmers and ranchers to produce the food that pantries and schools distributed to those in need. '[Funding] is no longer available and those agreements will be terminated following 60-day notification,' a USDA spokesperson bluntly told Politico when the cuts were discovered. Food banks depend on federal funding to help those in need. The USDA cuts have hit these organizations hard, stifling their ability to fulfill their missions in West Virginia, New York, California, Maryland, Washington, Oregon and beyond. Three District of Columbia-area food banks have delivered 1.4 million fewer meals since the USDA action, and these numbers are certain to grow. The need for food banks has never been greater. According to the USDA's own data, over 47 million people resided in food-insecure households in 2023. Demand in Nebraska is four times greater than it was in 2018, while some food pantries in Texas are serving 25 percent more people today than before the pandemic. And in what may be the most troubling statistic of all, nearly half of the residents in Kentucky and Indiana face an impossible choice of either paying for food or covering their utility bills. The USDA actions were a potential blow to farmers — a constituency the Trump administration has vowed to protect. They also defy the Trump administration's 'Farmers First' agenda. 'The defense of the family farm is a defense of everything America has been — and everything we will be,' wrote USDA Secretary Brooke L. Rollins in announcing the imperative. 'It is my privilege to come to their defense.' Canceling these programs is a slap in the face to every farmer who relies on federal support to help vulnerable Americans receive the food they need to survive. These economic initiatives drive local agriculture and are a vital source of revenue, especially for small farm operators. The USDA cuts deepen the impact for those who already lack access to healthy meals. Before the USDA rollbacks began, nearly 10 million children were at risk of going hungry this summer due to states opting out of the Summer Electronic Benefit Transfer program. Eliminating federal support for food banks will make their untenable situation even worse. And if House Republicans move forward with a plan to decimate the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program in their proposed budget bill, the hunger crisis in America could become a full-blown emergency. SNAP currently helps 40 million low-income families afford groceries every month. The House bill, if approved, would gut the program by more than $260 billion over the next 10 years to help offset the Trump administration's tax cut proposals. The House GOP plan puts an added burden on states to make up the difference in SNAP support, many of which are financially strapped and won't be able to cover the funding gap. The USDA cuts come at a time when food prices are expected to rise 3.5 percent in 2025 alone due to recent tariff increases. They will have a 'significant and damaging impact' for millions who rely on these programs for food support, Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and other U.S. senators have argued. Administration officials and members of Congress alike should heed the warnings from those on the front lines who run food banks and have seen firsthand the impacts the USDA cuts have had on their ability to address food insecurity in their communities. 'We've never before faced a situation like we are in now,' said Michael McKee, CEO of Virginia-based Blue Ridge Area Food Bank. '[The] need is well beyond any disaster or financial crisis that we've seen, and the government's response is to take food away.' 'This isn't about ideology,' he added. 'It's about math.' Let's have compassion for those with nothing to eat by restoring food programs that offer them nourishment and hope for a better future. Lyndon Haviland is a distinguished scholar at the CUNY School of Public Health and Health Policy.
Yahoo
23-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Washington is deciding — right now — to allow hunger to grow
I remember the hollow dread the first time I walked up to a food pantry door. The cupboards at home were empty. In the fridge, a single serving of chicken and dumplings sat, carefully rationed into two meals a day for four long days. My last few dollars had gone into the gas tank just to get to work, and I was surviving on pocket change until payday. That feeling — desperation wrapped in shame — is something you don't forget. Fifteen years later, standing in the Tacoma Dome parking lot as an Emergency Food Network staff member, I watched hundreds of cars snake around the block, each waiting for the team from Eloise's Cooking Pot to place a week's worth of food into their trunk. Their faces reflected emotions I knew well: brief relief, quiet embarrassment, sincere gratitude — and beneath it all, deep exhaustion. But it's not just Eloise's. Every day, across Pierce County, Emergency Food Network's 75+ partner programs see the same unrelenting need. Thousands of seniors, families and people experiencing homelessness turn to us — not because they made bad choices but because they've been backed into a corner by rising costs and stagnant wages. Yet while the need grows, the lifelines people depend on are being ripped away. In March, the USDA slashed over $1 billion from programs that kept food flowing to food banks and schools. The Local Food Purchase Assistance program — which strengthened both local farms and hungry families — was wiped out entirely. Then another blow: The Emergency Food Assistance Program — the backbone of the federal emergency food system — was gutted by $500 million. Here in Washington, that means up to $25 million lost in food funding in just three weeks. At EFN, that's not just a statistic — it's 19 food deliveries that won't reach hungry families. It's $500,000 in support for local farmers gone. It's a 40% hole in our Emergency Food Assistance Program allocation, at a time when visits to our network have already topped 800,000 this year — an alarming 17% increase over last year. And the betrayal isn't just federal. While both the House and Senate in Olympia fully funded emergency food programs, Gov. Bob Ferguson's budget proposes a $52 million cut to food bank funding. In the middle of a hunger crisis, that's not just bad policy — that's abandonment. Let's be clear: Hunger is not inevitable. Hunger is a policy choice. We need our state legislators to hold the line. We need our federal lawmakers to remember who they serve. And we need every single one of you to raise your voice. Congress is in recess. Your representatives are home. Find them. Call them. Tell them to protect SNAP. Restore USDA food programs. Fully fund emergency food efforts. Thank the champions — and demand better from the rest. If you've never faced an empty cupboard, I hope you never will. If you have, you know why I'm asking. No one — no child, no senior, no family — should have to survive on hope and spare change. Enough is enough. Lianna Olds is deputy director of the Emergency Food Network.
Yahoo
22-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
New York's food banks brace for triple whammy of federal cuts, tariffs and even higher costs
A tiny storefront in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, has been a lifeline for Marco Ramirez and his family of four. Three years ago, the 56-year-old began visiting the food pantry operated by Reaching-Out Community Services after his hours as a restaurant cook were cut. Every two weeks, he stops by to select items from a computer kiosk and waits for staff to wheel out his order, free of charge. On a recent Wednesday afternoon, Ramirez packed his bags with staples like rice, meat, cooking oil and juice. Without the pantry's help, he said, his family wouldn't be able to afford pricey items like eggs. The pantry is part of a vast network supported by the Food Bank for New York City, which recently lost 75 tractor trailer loads of food — 2.5 million meals — due to cancelled shipments from the US Department of Agriculture following President Donald Trump's abrupt cancellation of over $1 billion in nutrition funding in March. 'We're the country's largest USDA-supplied food bank, and anytime there's a cut or a rollback or a pause, the impact to us is that much more exponential,' said president Leslie Gordon. The organization serves the New York City area, where a recent study estimated the poverty rate hit a new high of 25 percent. For food banks across New York state, the state of emergency that began with the pandemic in 2020 never ended. Already stretched thin from years of rising food costs and food insecurity, hunger relief organizations are now contending with a panoply of federal cuts and tariffs, which are expected to severely disrupt supply chains and further hike prices. Headlines about steep declines in port activity have renewed fears that shelves nationwide could go empty in a matter of weeks. Trump's cuts have derailed programs like the Local Food Purchase Assistance Cooperative Agreement Program (LFPA), which allowed food banks to purchase food from local farms, and the Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP), which ships food directly to banks and helps cover operational costs. In recent years, the USDA has expanded TEFAP to meet increased demand from more Americans turning to pantries to stay afloat. New York's newly passed state budget provided little relief. For months, advocates had urged Governor Kathy Hochul to join the legislature in increasing funding for two state-run hunger programs as a way to cushion the blow of federal cuts. But funding for both programs remained largely unchanged in the final deal released last week. Nourish New York will see a modest increase of $750,000 for a total of $55 million, while the Hunger Prevention and Nutrition Assistance Program will remain flat at $57.8 million. The legislature had proposed funding the programs at $75 million each. In the wake of federal cuts, the Regional Food Bank will distribute 2 million less meals across 23 eastern New York counties, which span from just north of Westchester to the Canadian border — after opening a new 50,000-square-foot distribution center in Montgomery in December. 'These cuts mean families going hungry; kids, veterans, and seniors going hungry, and farmers going out of business,' said Congressman Pat Ryan after visiting the food bank last month. 'Trump needs to put country before politics, reverse these cuts immediately, and restore the food shipments to put money back in our farmers' pockets and nutritious meals back on Hudson Valley families' tables.' Over 16 million pounds of food across the state will no longer be distributed due to federal cuts, according to Ryan Healy, advocacy manager of Feeding New York State, which represents 10 food banks across the state, including the ones interviewed for this story. 'Not only is the impact of these cuts felt by our food banks and community partners, it's felt by the farmers and agricultural producers,' Healy said. In addition to USDA shipments, eight of the network's food banks received LFPA funding, which has been a boon to local farms across the state. 'We had about a million pounds of food that were cancelled that we were expected to be distributing right about now,' said Ryan Brisk, vice president of operations and procurement at Feeding Westchester. 'A million pounds is 25 tractor trailer loads of food.' That particular shipment included what Brisk called the 'most highly coveted items' sought by food pantry users, like fresh produce and frozen meat. TEFAP shipments have accounted for a quarter of the organization's food supply. In 2024, Feeding Westchester saw an average of 229,000 visits each month, including 80,000 children and 36,000 seniors. Many visits come from families where adults work multiple jobs, as well as veterans and seniors living on fixed incomes, Brisk said. That need has not tapered off since the onset of Covid-19: 'It was the pandemic passing the torch to inflation.' In Long Island's Nassau and Suffolk counties, Island Harvest has doubled the amount of food it distributes since 2019. 'The need for emergency food is greater now than it was during the pandemic,' said Gregory May, director of government and community relations. 'The trends are really going in the wrong direction.' Island Harvest relies heavily on donated food, which makes up roughly 75 percent of its stock. May worries whether those donations will continue as businesses feel the crunch of a tightening economy. The situation could become even more grim if the federal government moves forward with cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program(SNAP), also known as food stamps, May said. Congressional Republicans are now considering a drastic overhaul of the program as a way to partially cover another round of Trump tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy. 'I don't think a lot of people realize how connected they are to the emergency food system,' May said. 'A cut to one program is really a cut to every program.' Staff at FeedMore Western New York are still trying to make sense of how a variety of cuts — TEFAP, LFPA, and funding from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which has also been paused — will impact their bottom line. Feedmore serves Erie, Niagara, Cattaraugus, and Chautauqua counties. 'We are being impacted in every way you can imagine by decisions being made by the federal government,' said public relations manager Catherine Shick. Last year, the organization received nearly $15 million in federal support to operate its food bank network, provide SNAP outreach, deliver meals to the homebound, and supply community kitchens. FeedMore has increased the number of people it serves by 46 percent since 2021. Tariffs add yet another 'unknown' that FeedMore has to monitor, with some vendors warning of potential food price increases, Shick said. Inflation was cited as a top affordability concern for Billi-Jo Mendez, a first-time pantry user in Brooklyn who was next in line to Ramirez on Wednesday. 'In all my years, I've never come to a pantry,' said Mendez, 52. 'I came for extra help.' Mendez said she and her husband have been making do on their own, but recently received custody of their three grandchildren. Her basket included sacks of apples and carrots, as well as cereal and baked chips for the kids. 'It's so sad,' Mendez said of federal cuts. 'A lot of people are going to go hungry without assistance from a program like this.' Gordon at Food Bank for New York City said it's too soon to tell exactly what impact tariffs will have, but the the current situation is unlike past 'rough patches.' 'There's a lack of predictability that is causing things to be more upended than they have been before,' Gordon said. 'We definitely have not seen this convergence of external factors to this degree, and all at once, impacting the good work we're trying to do for people who need us.'
Yahoo
16-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Federal funding cuts leading to crisis in local food pantries
Cuts to federal funding are impacting Second Harvest Food Bank of the Metrolina, and trickling down to other local organizations. Channel 9's Gina Esposito found that even in Union County, smaller food pantries are facing big problems. Common Heart in Union County said their back wall is normally filled with food, but some of the shelves were bare on Friday, and a normally-stocked fridge was diminished. But while the supplies are fewer, the bustling of carts was non-stop at the food pantry in Waxhaw. Box after box went into about 200 cars that were lined up. 'My husband and I are seniors, and the grocery store prices have risen. We come out to get a supplement,' said Doris Mills. Behind the scenes, Ryan Kolbe with Common Heart says he wasn't sure if they'd even have meat to give out. 'It's really difficult with all the uncertainty and I'm glad this pantry turned out well. Second Harvest was able to get this together, but going through the weeks leading up to it, not knowing if there was going to be enough,' Kolbe said. On April 13, the nonprofit sent Common Heart a letter saying cuts at the U.S. Department of Agriculture slashed funding for the Emergency Food Assistance Program, or TEFAP, by 50%. As a result, Second Harvest is distributing less produce, dairy and frozen meat to its partner agencies, like Common Heart. For this quarter, there wouldn't be any milk, eggs, or cheese. The following week, Common Heart got a notice that it wouldn't get its TEFAP food allocation for the rest of the month. 'On May 2, looking at our freezer, we had four boxes of ground beef left that was enough to serve one or two pantries, then we would have nothing,' Kolbe said. He says they were able to pick up some TEFAP food last week, but he worries it may not be enough to feed all of the people who really need it. Common Heart says because of the uncertainty with their meat supply, they need people to donate canned meat like tuna fish. They're also asking for people to donate to cover the costs cut by the federal government. You can help by taking part in Channel 9's Food Drive at this link. (VIDEO: Community helps rebuild food truck swept away in Hurricane Helene)
Yahoo
13-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Opportunity House opening new food pantry in Reading
A new food pantry set to open Thursday in Reading will help provide nutritious food to individuals and families in need. Opportunity House has announced the opening of its Beacon House Food Pantry at 821 Schuylkill Ave. 'The Beacon House Food Pantry is an important step in expanding our services to ensure that individuals and families in our community have access to fresh, healthy food,' Alyssa Bushkie, COO of Opportunity House, said in a statement. The pantry offers essential food assistance to anyone experiencing food insecurity, she said. Much of the food distributed by Beacon House is sourced from Helping Harvest Fresh Food Bank, a partner of Opportunity House since 1984. As part of this long-standing collaboration, Opportunity House also operates a food pantry at its main campus, 430 N. Second St., and uses food provided by Helping Harvest to prepare meals and snacks for clients residing in its emergency shelter. 'We are grateful for the continued partnership with Helping Harvest Fresh Food Bank, whose generous support enables us to provide high-quality food to those in need,' Bushkie said. Opportunity House's Emergency Food Assistance Program follows guidelines set by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Eligibility is determined based on household size and annual income. The Beacon House pantry also addresses a critical need in the area: limited access to full-service grocery stores. This condition, known as a food desert, makes it difficult for many residents to secure fresh, affordable and nutritious food. In neighborhoods throughout the city, particularly in low-income and underserved areas, residents are often forced to rely on costly corner stores with limited healthy options, the organization said. Transportation barriers, mobility issues and limited financial resources further prevent individuals and families from accessing the quality food they need. The Beacon House Food Pantry will be open on Thursdays and Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. For more information about receiving food assistance, contact Kim Long, director of case management, at klong@ or call 610-374-4696 ext. 238. Opportunity House relies on volunteers and community support to operate the food pantry and continue its mission of empowering individuals to improve their lives. To donate, visit To volunteer, contact Stacy Perlaki at sperlaki@ or call 610-374-4696 ext. 231.
