The threat to food benefits is real. And hunger is no joke.
Hunger can result in poor health outcomes, poor school performance, and poor job performance. It makes good decision-making hard. It forces individuals to pit basic needs against each other. Food or rent. Rent or child care. Gas or food.
Hunger is categorized in three ways: Food security, food insecutiry, and low food security. USDA defines the terms:
- Food secure households had access, at all times, to enough food for an active, healthy life for all household members.
- Food-insecure households are uncertain of having, or unable to acquire, at some time during the year, enough food to meet the needs of all their members because they had insufficient money or other resources for food. . . Food-insecure households include those with low food security and very low food security.
- Households with very low food security are food insecure to the extent that normal eating patterns of some household members are disrupted at times during the year, with self-reported food intake below levels considered adequate.
On the flip side, hunger alleviation programs such as SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, aka food stamps) improve performance, job attendance, and more. Explains the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities,
SNAP is our nation’s most effective and important tool to fight hunger, reaching over 40 million children, parents, older adults, disabled people, workers, and other low-income people each month, or about 1 in 8 people in the U.S., including 1 in 5 children. Research shows SNAP reduces food insecurity and is linked to improved health, education, and economic outcomes and to lower medical costs for participants. It also supports workers in low-paid jobs and has ripple effects in the economy overall and in individual communities as SNAP benefits are redeemed in stores across the U.S.
President Trump and Congressional Republicans, along with conservative leaders across the country, have proposed in Project 2025 and reconciliation docs, for example, to cut and make other changes to SNAP (among many other programs). In addition, the House Agriculture Committee is considering requiring states to pay more for SNAP benefits and increasing work requirements. Project 2025 recs are shown below.
And just this week, President Trump ordered a pause on federal spending. This had advocates, analysts, Virginia Department of Health staff, members of the Virginia Congressional delegation, and others scrambling to determine if SNAP was included. A day later, the Office of Manageement and Budget, which issued the original order (M-25-13, found on this blog), rescinded the memo but not some of the underlying funding pauses. SNAP was not caught up in any of the Executive Orders and related funding pauses that remain in effect.
There are ways to mitigate inflation and cuts, and while nothing can replace full SNAP benefits, some efforts are better than no efforts. Iowa legislators, for example, took a first step last week when they discussed and agreed to moving a bill to expand the state’s Double Up Food Bucks program. With the funding, families are given “up to $15 a day in matching funds for buying fruits and vegetables at farmers’ markets, grocery stores, and other participating locations.” (Source) These types of programs a far wider impact, as Expanding Healthy Food Incentives Increases Community Wealth explains:
Years of research shows these programs improve health by providing low-income families more money for food, especially fruits and vegetables, helping reduce hunger and improve nutrition. As people using incentive programs increase their food purchases at grocery stores, corner stores, and farmers’ markets – and are able to stretch their budgets elsewhere – they infuse more money into the economy, providing an overall stimulus.
Food insecurity on the NNK
According to the SNAP Monthly Participation Report for the Northern Neck December 2024 (excerpt shown below), more than 7,500 people in nearly 4,000 households received SNAP in December 2024. The population of the NNK according to US Census 2023 estimates was 50,000.
SNAP data actually underrepresents the number of individuals and households/families who are food insecure. Some may think the program covers all in need but this is absolutely not the case. SNAP eligibility includes, in part, income. The table Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program - Income Eligibility Standards And Maximum Allotments (below) details income caps by household size.
Benefit usage is well documented and shows that benefits commonly run out during the third week of the month (benefits are issued the first week of the month). Actual SNAP benefit values are detailed in the table by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, below.
To fill the gap, thousands of NNK residents make use of food pantries and new-ish little pantries operated by various nonprofit organizations across the region. Healthy Harvest Food Bank (HHFB) reports that in FY 2023 (July 1, 2022 - June 30, 2023), 7,000 people were served by 27 partner agencies. In addition, there are food pantries which are not affiliated with HHFB and/or little pantries, such as the ones located at Kilmarnock Town Hall and Trinity Episcopal Church in Lancaster, which distribute free food.
As the Trump administration progresses, it is incumbant for policy wonks, individuals interested in alleviating hunger, and social serving organizations to pay attention so that they can sound the alarm and/or ramp up food sharing.