Many families rely on food banks. However, with new federal cuts they are at greater risks of being cut.
Connecticut Foodshare says the wave of federal funding cuts will impact vulnerable communities it provides food to and that it has lost a total of 1.4 million pounds of food in the most recent cuts to the Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP).
“It’s going to be a difficult couple of months,” Jason Jakubowski, Connecticut Foodshare president and CEO, said. “Especially if we’re living in this environment in which we don’t know what’s going to be coming from the federal government.”
The TEFAP program provides funding to Connecticut Foodshare, which in return provides food to local food pantries and kitchens.
In Bloomfield, it means that hundreds of people who get food from the Bloomfield Congregational Church could now be vulnerable.
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“Over 50% of the food that we get is from TEFAP,” the church’s pastor Rev. Shawn Fisher said. “If the administration doesn’t care about the poor, this church does.”
Fisher said that his church will find a way to adapt and that he expects more people to come in the following months due to funding cuts in other programs.
“I don’t know what the future is going to be for a lot of the people that we serve,” Jakubowski said. “I have to imagine we are planning for there to be more people over the next couple of years that are food insecure.”
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Connecticut Foodshare estimates it will cost them approximately $1.75 million to replace the 34 trucks of food that were canceled because of the funding cut.
The organization is pushing for a bill that would help fund the gap.
“We need to step up,” Sen. Matt Lesser said. “We can’t replace all of what the federal government isn’t doing, but we have to do something.”
Bill No. 7021 would increase the funding to the Connecticut Nutrition Assistance Program (CT-NAP), which provides funds to Connecticut Foodshare to buy food.
The funding would increase from $850,000 to $10 million annually if the bill is passed.
