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The president released his proposed FY 2018 budget this month that calls for $193 billion in cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) over the next decade. These deep cuts represent a 25 percent reduction in funding, a move that would increase hunger and deepen poverty for millions of Americans already struggling to make ends meet.  About 67,000 individuals in Contra Costa County and 40,000 in Solano County relied on federally-funded SNAP benefits each month of 2016 – about half of whom were children.

In an effort to reduce federal spending on SNAP, the budget both cuts vital nutrition funding and pushes costs onto states—an historic shift that would permanently alter SNAP’s entitlement structure and abandon our nation’s long-standing bi-partisan commitment to combat hunger. The current structure of SNAP allows the program to flexibly expand and contract its caseload based on need, ensuring that benefits are available to anyone who qualifies. The proposed changes, however, would require states to pay for 25 percent of benefits that are currently fully funded by the federal government.

Restructuring SNAP’s program structure would require California to absorb $1.8 billion annually in SNAP benefit costs. Such cost-shifting measures would undermine SNAP’s efficiency, flexibility, and reach—particularly in times of economic recession.

The budget proposal also targets low-income seniors and the working poor by proposing to eliminate the minimum monthly SNAP benefit of $16. This would result in 110,000 individuals in California being kicked off the program, the vast majority of whom are seniors living on Social Security and low-income workers who use SNAP to supplement their earnings. Eliminating the minimum benefit would also cause the state to lose $14 million each month in SNAP benefits that currently flow into local economies and support food retailers and farmers.

The president’s budget contains a number of other harmful proposals that would increase hunger, restrict eligibility and reduce benefits for California’s low-income families. These threats including time limiting SNAP benefits for childless workers in areas of high unemployment, benefit caps for large SNAP households, and prohibiting California and other states with high costs of living from assisting families with incomes over 130 percent of the federal poverty line.

These proposed cuts to SNAP would force even more Americans to rely on emergency food assistance providers like food banks, but the president’s budget proposes $27 million in cuts to these charitable organizations. The federal Temporary Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP) provides local organizations with dried and canned food items, representing more than 13% of all pounds distributed by the Food Bank of Contra Costa and Solano last year.

“There is no way that food banks and other charities could replace the proposed billions in cuts to SNAP benefits,” says Caitlin Sly, Program Director at the Food Bank of Contra Costa and Solano. “Food banks are a complement, not a substitute, to the safety net.” Only 1 in 20 emergency assistance meals are provided by nonprofits, the rest flow through federal nutrition programs like SNAP.

The budget proposal also includes cuts of $627 billion from Medicaid, $21 billion from Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF, also known as Welfare-to-Work), and $72 billion from Social Security programs like Supplemental Security Income (SSI) that support low-income seniors and people with disabilities.

The president’s budget sends the message that hunger is an acceptable outcome in America. The Food Bank is urging Congress to oppose any budget proposal that goes back on our decades-long commitment to eradicate hunger and support a bi-partisan budget deal that invests in the health and nutrition of nation’s most vulnerable residents. 

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On Tuesday Governor Brown revealed a conservative 2016-17 Budget Proposal that maintains recession-era cuts to the vital Supplemental Security Income (SSI) Program. SSI is a very basic income available to blind, disabled, and aged individuals who have limited or no income and resources. The maximum grant for an individual is just 90% of the federal poverty line.

Despite steady economic growth and a healthy state budget reserve, the Governor’s proposal fails to make desperately-needed investments in SSI to allow seniors and people with disabilities to share in the state’s prosperity.

The maximum SSI benefit for an individual is only $895/month, which is barely enough to afford rent – let alone food – in the Bay Area. Because SSI recipients are ineligible to receive CalFresh nutrition assistance benefits, most rely heavily on food banks, sometimes as their only source of nutrition.

“There are days when I only have bread to eat,” says Toni, an SSI recipient from Concord.

Toni says she wouldn’t have even that if it weren’t for the groceries and hot meals she receives from the Food Bank distribution at her local church. She receives just $909 each month in SSI and Social Security Disability Insurance. After paying $870 in rent for her small apartment, Toni must choose whether to spend her remaining $39 on medication, transportation, or toiletries. “You have to pay all the other bills first. Food has to be last.”

After 10 years without a state-funded increase to SSI, advocates successfully negotiated a one-time cost of living adjustment through last year’s state budget process. The 2.67% increase to the state’s contribution is an important step towards restoring benefits, but it is nowhere near enough to lift California’s 1.3 million SSI recipients out of poverty.

Lisa, an SSI recipient from Bay Point, saw her income rise just $5 this year. “Five dollars means that I can maybe afford to do two loads of laundry,” she says. “I still don’t have enough money to survive. We have gone without food for days… I can’t afford even the minimum.”

The 2016-17 state budget can and must reinstate SSI benefits to their pre-recession levels and add a meaningful cost-of-living adjustment so that no one has to suffer the indignity of hunger.

“I wish there was a way for me to talk to Governor Brown myself,” says Lisa. “Do you think he knows what it’s like to worry about a bill so much it gives you a stomachache first thing when you wake up every morning?”

President Obama’s Advisory Council for Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships released a report last week that provides recommendations to the incoming President on combatting economic inequality in America. This report, Strengthening Efforts to Increase Opportunity and End Poverty, argues that we must go beyond service provision to address past and present systems of structural racism and discrimination.

The factors have given rise to current levels of extreme inequality and financial insecurity are numerous and complex. The report’s authors assert that “efforts to substantially alleviate poverty must address underlying economic, social, and racial justice issues” if they are to be effective and sustainable. In addition to historic and present structural discrimination, the report points to a weakening of the social safety net, declining wages, concentrated poverty and wealth, mass incarceration, and a broken immigration system as underlying causes of economic inequality.

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also known as CalFresh, was cited as a fundamental and proven tool to fight poverty and inequality. These grocery benefits lifted as many as 10 million people out of poverty in 2014, including 5 million children. Research shows that children who receive food assistance have lifelong improvements in their educational, health, and economic outcomes. The Food Bank works diligently to increase access and strengthen the CalFresh program through our policy advocacy, direct outreach, and partnerships with county CalFresh departments.

The authors’ primary anti-hunger recommendation is to expand the use of food insecurity screenings in health care settings. They call for federal guidance to health care providers on screening their patients’ access to food, integrating patient responses into their medical record, and providing referrals to nutrition-assistance programs like CalFresh. These practices could combat hunger, improve health outcomes for low-income individuals and families, and reduce health care costs. The Food Bank is very supportive of this recommendation and is currently looking at how we can partner with local health care providers to systematize food insecurity screening and referrals.

Although screening for food insecurity and prescribing programs like CalFresh are moral imperatives in the fight to end hunger, the report issues in-depth recommendations to prevent that need from arising in the first place. The authors argue that in order to fulfill our national commitment to end extreme poverty and hunger in America by 2030, we must shift our understanding of poverty away from individualized instances of “personal responsibility” to work toward economic, social, and racial justice.

To learn more about the Council for Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships’ analysis of poverty and solutions to inequality, we encourage you to read the full report.

The State Budget is more than an estimate of California’s annual revenues and expenses; it is an expression of our collective values and priorities. The expansion of anti-hunger investments in the 2016-17 State Budget, which Governor Brown signed into law on Monday, June 27, 2016, reflects a strengthened commitment to end hunger in California.

In the most agriculturally productive state in the nation, nearly 14% of the state’s general population is considered food insecure. This means they occasionally or consistently can’t afford the food needed for a healthy and active lifestyle. As many as 1 in 4 children go to bed hungry each night. Food insecurity can negatively impact school attendance and performance, workplace productivity, and general health.

The nutritional investments in the 2016-17 budget are a testament to the magnitude of this issue as well as the strength of existing anti-hunger programs. Due to fears of a looming recession, the state targeted limited funds to expand successful pilots and strengthen established distribution networks. The budget includes measures to strengthen California’s food banks, encourage the adoption of innovative school breakfast programs, and expand incentives for nutrition assistance recipients to shop at farmers’ markets.

The state’s investment in local food banks will increase food access, improve public health, and support California’s farmers. The State Emergency Food Assistance Program (SEFAP) will provide $2 million to emergency food providers to purchase and distribute California-grown foods. California food banks are able to provide an average of five meals for every dollar in funding they receive. By funding community based distribution networks directly, SEFAP is expected to provide an additional 10 million meals to low-income Californians next fiscal year.

The budget also increases, simplifies, and extends an existing tax credit for agricultural producers who donate excess produce to California food banks. The previous tax credit boosted donations by 50% since it was established in 2011, but it will expire at the end of this calendar year. These financial incentives offset the considerable costs associated with harvesting, packaging, and transporting donations, and will help divert millions of pounds of food from landfills directly to those who need it the most.

Only about half of the eligible children that receive free and reduced-price school lunches in California are able to take advantage of school breakfast. Innovative after-the-bell breakfast pilots have increased participation, improved class attendance, enhanced academic performance, and decreased disciplinary incidents. The state’s commitment of an additional $2 million to increase startup and expansion grants for after-the-bell breakfast programs in high-poverty schools will ensure that all children start the school day with the energy they need to learn, grow, and achieve.

Finally, the state’s contribution of $5 million to expand existing nutrition incentive programs will support local farmers and improve access to nutritious foods for low-income households. Commonly known as Market Match, these funds double the purchasing power of CalFresh recipients when they use their grocery credits at farmers’ markets. As farmers continue to reel from the drought and diet-related illnesses among low-income individuals become more prevalent, Market Match could generate an additional $60 million in sales for California growers while improving public health and nutrition.

While these budget commitments will not be enough to end hunger, they represent carefully targeted investments in proven and effective programs. The anti-hunger provisions in the 2016-17 State Budget merit celebration, but there is still much to be done in the public and private sectors to address food insecurity in California. The resounding and relentless calls from the anti-hunger community helped get us this far, and they will not quiet until food access is recognized and realized as a right for all.

Federal nutrition assistance programs are under attack, once more.

This month the House Budget Committee passed a FY2017 Budget Resolution that would cut $3.5 trillion from programs for low-income households over the next ten years, including $150 billion in cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). If enacted, these changes would exacerbate hunger and deepen poverty for millions of Americans.

SNAP, known as CalFresh in California, is a federally-funded nutrition assistance program that provides grocery credits to low-income households. In 2014 the SNAP program raised 4.7 million Americans out of poverty, including 2.1 million children. The proposed 29 percent cuts would force SNAP administrators to choose to reduce benefits or kick currently-eligible households off the program.

Even at present nearly 80 percent of SNAP grocery credits are redeemed within the first two weeks, indicating that benefit amounts are not enough to last recipients the entire month. April, a SNAP recipient from Vallejo, said that with four teenage children, her grocery credits only last a week and a half. She uses SNAP “to buy them meat and milk and all the expensive things…then we come [a Food Bank distribution] for whatever else we need.” Any further cuts to the program would place an enormous burden on both SNAP recipients and the emergency food networks that would have to fill that gap.

The resolution bundles deep cuts with a mandate to convert SNAP to a block grant, which is an annual lump sum given to states to administer a program. Federal SNAP funding is currently an uncapped stream that fluctuates based on enrollment. A block grant would significantly reduce the program’s ability to respond immediately to unforeseen changes in need.

For example, between 2007 and 2013 when nearly 20 million additional people became eligible for nutrition assistance during the recession, SNAP caseloads increased by close to 40% to meet demand. During this same period, the block granted program Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) barely budged despite a similar increase in need and eligibility. TANF caseloads peaked in 2010 with a 16 percent increase and had already fallen below pre-recession levels by 2013. SNAP’s ability to immediately respond to increased need during economic downturns is one of its strongest features. This flexibility should be strengthened and protected, not eroded by a block grant.

Although supporters of block grants argue that it gives more control to states, SNAP is county administered in California and there is already substantial local control over eligibility, implementation, and oversight. During times of recession, block grants would force states to choose between cutting benefits to households, creating waiting lists for families in need, or even shifting funds away from food assistance to fill other budget shortfalls.

Without a block grant, states have a significant incentive to increase enrollment among eligible individuals in times of economic downturn. More qualified participants mean more federal dollars streaming into local economies. According to a 2015 report by California Food Policy Advocates, if every qualified household in Contra Costa and Solano enrolled in SNAP it would annually generate more than $147 million and $43 million in economic activity for each county, respectively. Under a block grant, however, this incentive rapidly disappears. Dollars that aren’t spent on SNAP benefits can be redirected to other areas in the budget.

The calls in this report to defund and restructure SNAP hinge on concerns of “relentless and unsustainable growth.” Although caseloads have yet to come down to pre-2007 levels, they have been steadily declining since 2013.  When the recession hit, the program responded exactly as it was intended to: its caseload ballooned to meet increased need. The fact that millions of people continue to qualify for nutrition assistance is reflective of a slow and deeply uneven recovery, not a fatal flaw in the program.

As a nation, we should focus on job creation and job training, not kicking the ladder out from under those that remain unemployed or underemployed. The Food Bank is strongly opposed to the House Budget Committee’s resolution to cut and block grant SNAP, and we encourage you to reach out to your Representatives in the House to ask them to oppose these disastrous changes.

Carly Finkle is the Advocacy Manager for the Food Bank of Contra Costa and Solano and can be reached at cfinkle@foodbankccs.org.