California budget would slash funding for state food banks

The temperature was nearing degrees in Woodland on a current Monday afternoon but in the parking lot of the Home Church the mission continued Undeterred by the high sun and cloudless sky area residents queued up dozens deep waiting for the food distribution to begin Sometimes people start lining up at noon and we don t distribute until noted Jason Hammond a church member as he hurriedly bagged up fruit and vegetables to go with the other groceries on this day four bags of food and water for each person in line When it s hot like this they ll try to find a shady spot But they don t leave Every Monday people in this Yolo County town know that if they need food Home Church will be providing The weekly count usually comes in at to folks meaning that upward of a thousand people a month walk out with food for thousands more enough for several meals anyway If you re standing here you need it or your family requirements it announced Derrick who was th in line He noted he had been coming here on a weekly basis for the past couple of years This is how you get blessings It s simple but it works The scheme is also under threat Because this is where the fallout from big-picture federal and state funding conversations eventually lands a parking lot on a weekday a limited hundred people in need California Gov Gavin Newsom s budget for the - fiscal year has generated more attention for his walkback of Medi-Cal expansions than anything else but tucked in among the multiple proposed cuts is a small stunner a nearly reduction in funding for a state venture called CalFood from million to million a year CalFood run by the nonprofit California Association of Food Banks allocates the state funds to its members more than up and down the state to buy food from California farmers to distribute to those in need The fresh food winds up in grocery bags at places like Home Church a distribution point for the participating Yolo Food Bank This isn t the only way that the food banks operate They ve traditionally received nearly a quarter of their food supply from federal commodity programs and more is donated by farms and rescued from stores with surplus food that s nearing an expiration date or doesn t meet certain cosmetic standards for sale But the state funding for CalFood is a direct line It buys fresh meat fruit and vegetables specifically from California farms and producers for people who need it and the money is often used to purchase both high-protein food and culturally relevant items like tortillas chilis and pita bread Last year CalFood funding accounted for of food banks budget for such purchases and in rural areas it s often a much larger percentage than that The drop from million to million if the funding is not sustained will have an immediate impact on the amount of food that food banks will be able to provide their communities disclosed Stacia Hill Levenfeld CEO of the California Association of Food Banks It s also a loss of million that would have been invested in local food producers Earlier this year the association urged its members how they would cope with such steep funding cuts Largest part mentioned they d reduce the amount of food offered per household and buy less California-grown and produced food About in disclosed they d have to close distribution sites Levenfeld announced State funding for CalFood ramped up after the onset of the COVID- pandemic as Californians were thrown out of work and food insecurity figures shot up across the state In addition to its million baseline funding the activity was allotted an additional million essentially an urgency response And although COVID rates are down Newsom s budget proposal to return to baseline funding would gut the plan when food insecurity is still running well above prepandemic levels researchers say In Los Angeles County of all households are struggling to put adequate food on the table according to a USC inquiry Statewide of all households are food insecure including of households with children The need is there For the second consecutive year California food banks are serving million people each month Levenfeld mentioned Those are unprecedented numbers in the state The system faces ongoing uncertainty about federal help as the Trump administration continues attempting to slash funding for a number of safety net programs Congressional Republicans are taking aim at SNAP the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Effort which directs money to low-income households so they can buy groceries If CalFresh the state s version of SNAP takes a huge financial hit the pressure on local food banks to provide for their communities will only ratchet up But based on Newsom s budget proposal they ll have dramatically less with which to make that happen California feeds the world There s no excuse for not taking care of our own first California Assemblymember Stephanie Nguyen notified Capital Main Nguyen D-Sacramento and State Sen John Laird D-Santa Cruz are pushing legislators to reinstate CalFood s full million budget Without proper funding children will go hungry Nguyen revealed No child in California should ever have to go to bed hungry It s a dark irony felt in a town like Woodland Surrounded by farmland and orchards it has long been an agricultural hub in Yolo County Nearly half of its population is Latino far above the state average and countless of those families have worked in farming for generations We grow the food but we can t afford it announced Hernanda a young woman who appealed that her last name not be used On this day she had already received her bags of groceries at Home Church and she now sat in the shade peeling back an orange the conclusion of a critically needed process that finds itself on the wrong end of a budget deficit Those are very different kinds of crises Capital Main is an award-winning nonprofit publication that reports from California on the majority pressing economic environmental and social issues of our time including economic inequality context change physical condition care threats to democracy hate and extremism and immigration Copyright Capital Main