Food insecurity remains a persistent issue among low-income families in North Carolina. In fact, about 600,000 children in our state rely on federal food assistance programs such as SNAP, or the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.
According to EdNC, SNAP brings relief to more than 1.4 million people in North Carolina. In addition to addressing hunger, SNAP supports jobs and local economies — particularly in rural communities, where food benefits play a crucial role in sustaining local grocery stores, EdNC reports.
“It’s a ripple effect because the parents are initially affected. This affects their physical ability to have access to purchase of resources, to purchase food, but the mental strain, the emotional strain that it puts on families and having to deal with the reality of figuring out how they’re going to make ends meet,” said L. Ron Pringle, president and CEO of Inter-Faith Food Shuttle, a nonprofit Raleigh-based food bank.
Harmful federal legislation from the Trump administration has made it harder for families to get access to food. For example, the federal reconciliation bill, or HR 1, reduced funding for the SNAP program by $186 billion through 2034, making it the largest cut to the program in history. To add insult to injury, the administration is also placing the burden of costs on states.
“I’ve been calling on the federal government to delay implementation of H.R. 1 until fiscal year 2030 so that we states and the counties have adequate time to reduce our error rates, and to hold states harmless for the errors that occurred during the chaotic period of the federal government shutdown, we need the General Assembly to fully fund SNAP in the state budget because we cannot risk losing this program,” said North Carolina Governor Josh Stein.
Food initiatives such as Inter-Faith Food Shuttle, MANNA FoodBank, Growing Minds, and SUN Meals-To-Go are making waves in helping children get access to nutritious food in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene and federal SNAP cuts.
To read about other food initiatives, go to EdNC.
