Hundreds of thousands of people in Connecticut are considered to be food insecure. The Hispanic Senior Center in Hartford says they serve up to 300 meals a week, and meals made by the Community Renewal Team could be cut down soon.
Connecticut is home to 472,000 food insecure people, according to Connecticut Foodshare President and CEO Jason Jakubowski.
“The numbers we’re seeing and the lines that we’re seeing at our distribution sites and our pantries across the state are as long now as they were at the peak of the pandemic,” Jakubowski said.
Many of those vulnerable people include senior citizens who depend on food programs to provide meals or groceries to them.
“A lot of seniors have no one else and coming here is just all in the family,” said Luis Henriquez, who has been going to the Hispanic Senior Center in Hartford for two years.
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Henriquez volunteers and helps serve food to other seniors.
“Some of them don’t cook and they have no one at home,” he said. “So, for them it’s very important to come and have their meal.”
These meals are provided by the Community Renewal Team (CRT), which provides meals to senior centers, senior housing and meals on wheels across the state.
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In East Hartford, the town said it has a waitlist for seniors to receive meals through its CRT program. It says during the 2024 fiscal year, it provided over 6,500 CRT meals for seniors. However, since November, it has had to reduce the number of meals served and is capped at 35 meals a day three times a week due to federal funding reductions.
Hispanic Senior Center Director Nilda Morales-Rivera said her center faces the same faith. In November, she said the center received a letter from CRT, which notified them of a reduction of federal funds.
They’d now only be able to serve a maximum of 28 meals a day, three days a week.
“It’s difficult for us, because we need the funds,” Morales-Rivera said. “We need the funds, that we can have food for the seniors every day.”
A CRT spokesperson said the decrease of funding is not a cut, but instead is happening because ARPA funding is ending. CRT said the meals were funded through federal dollars received via the North Central Area Agency on Aging, which are a combination of American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding and Older Americans Act (OAA) Nutrition Program.
They went on to say the funds are now returning to pre-pandemic levels, but it’s not enough to sustain the current demand.
Morales-Rivera said the city of Hartford stepped in to fund the gap left in the funding until the end of June but come July, they face the same dilemma.
The center estimates it’ll need $162,000 to fund meals for another year.
“We’re still working with community partners and legislators and trying to find ways that fill these gaps whether it’s through those partners, through donors, sponsor, anything like that,” Catholic Charities Director of Communication Scott Griffin said.
