The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program temporarily paused payments in November due to the federal government shutdown. The shutdown — which was the longest in U.S. history — ended Nov. 12 after 43 days and the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services directed its SNAP vendors to resume issuing full benefits to Michigan recipients. Multiple free food organizations in Ann Arbor experienced changes in demand from the community during the SNAP benefits pause.
Lesli Hoey, associate professor of urban and regional planning and food systems researcher, told The Michigan Daily food pantries tend to serve people who are just above the income threshold or who lack time and energy to obtain access to SNAP.
“Food pantries are often filling that gap for people who either are eligible but don’t have the time or energy to jump through bureaucratic hurdles to try to actually access SNAP,” Hoey said. “It’s also for people who fall into these moments in their life where they’re in a crisis, but from an annual income standpoint, they may not be eligible for SNAP. … What’s going to happen with cuts to SNAP is that people who were eligible and who were on it, on top of everybody else, are now going to be needing support systems.”
Hoey said the amount of time SNAP benefits were on pause may not seem long but could have been devastating for those who depend on that stipend to survive.
“The trend with SNAP users is that they run out of money before the end of the month,” Hoey said. “They already don’t have enough money to buy what they need. … Most SNAP recipients, by the end of the month, don’t know where their next meal is going to come from because they’ve run out of money.”
Food Gatherers is a food pantry and food rescue program located in Ann Arbor that serves greater Washtenaw County. They provide free or low-cost food and delivery to a network of more than 140 community partner organizations in the county. By providing 23,000 meals a day, Food Gatherers has been a cornerstone of food security for residents across Ann Arbor and Washtenaw County.
Markell Miller, director of community food programs at Food Gatherers, said in an interview with The Daily the lapse in SNAP benefits significantly increased community demand for food for them as well.
“Food Gatherers has definitely faced increased demand,” Miller said. “What that looks like for us is an increase in call volume and website visits. As a food bank, we help direct people to resources in the community where they can get free food, and we’ve seen a tremendous increase in people looking for assistance.”
Miller said Food Gatherers has also seen increased demand from their network of partners that they support.
“We are also in close contact with a network of partners of food pantries in the community that we give food to,” Miller said. “We’ve had to coordinate with them to get more food to them and increase our frequency of deliveries to restock them. So, we know that their volume of people coming has increased.”
Hoey told The Daily it’s more important than ever to increase connectivity between various organizations and institutions to fill the gaps for people needing food assistance.
“There are a variety of gaps in systems and people who suddenly are going to need (food assistance) who don’t know (where to go), so we need ways to make sure to communicate and spread the word among very different kinds of networks,” Hoey said. “Whether it’s churches, schools, universities or community centers, we need to find a way to make sure that people who have never needed (food assistance) before understand where they can go.”
Another organization focused on food support is Faith in Action, a food pantry that is open five days a week and receives community funding, oftentimes getting regular support from local religious organizations. With locations in Chelsea and Dexter, a key service of the organization is its emergency food hotline.
Executive Director Sarah Shugart said they felt the change in demand and increased stress from the community during the pause in SNAP.
“We did experience an increase in demand,” Shugart said. “We did have several clients that came as an increase, and we had an increase in our emergency pantry also. We saw definite stress and anxiety prior to SNAP being cut off and then during that time period. That’s an undocumented phenomenon that happens when people who rely on SNAP benefits are in a position where they don’t know how they’re going to feed their family.”
Shugart said despite the increased demand, there has been a community outpouring of support for Faith in Action’s food security initiatives.
“We live in a community that steps up when their neighbors need help, and so we had to order new shelving units because the influx of food from the community was pretty astronomical,” Shugart said. “We were able to really fill our shelves and to provide a little higher level of service during the SNAP pause than we typically could because our community showed up and came here with food drives and with funds to help us.”
LSA sophomore Kinsey Weisenberger, policy chair for the Maize & Blue Cupboard, said community members can help contribute to food security initiatives during a time when many food banks are low on resources by organizing regular food and donation drives.
“I think the biggest thing is donation drives,” Weisenberger said. “We’re always looking for community and student groups to work with to organize food drives, and continuous support is a big thing we’re looking for. It’s really easy to have a one-off event, but it’s really hard to have sustained food drives and events that (Maize & Blue Cupboard) can rely on.”
Environment and Sustainability graduate student Doris Kiambati, Grants Manager for the U-M Sustainable Food Program, said she’s seen increased spread of information across the U-M community on free food resources and support for food banks during this time.
“From my experience as a student during this time, I have seen a lot more people being made aware of the food resources on campus,” Kiambati said. “But also, in a lot of schools, there’s been internal food drives. I think it’s really got a lot more people thinking about how do we make sure that we’re providing food, which is a basic resource, for our community in a political climate that is threatening one of the only social assistance programs in our country.”
Daily News Contributor Greta Fear can be reached at gcfear@umich.edu.
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