Recent federal budget cuts are threatening local programs that help provide Contra Costa County residents and schoolchildren with healthy food and free meals.
The cuts will impact food banks that buy agricultural products from local farms and will restrict which schools are allowed to provide free breakfasts and lunches to students from lower-income families.
They come amid a flurry of recent actions from Republicans in Congress seeking ways to reduce federal spending and are sparking waves of concerns through local agencies, in particular the West Contra Costa Unified School District and the Food Bank of Contra Costa & Solano.
Officials at these entities say these reductions will harm children and community members who need help the most.
“We are experiencing a time of high need in our community and cuts to these vital safety nets are making the problems in our community worse,” said Caitlin Sly, the chief executive officer of the Food Bank of Contra Costa & Solano.
“It’s horrible that this is how things are being done,” said Judi Shils, the founder and executive director of Turning Green, which oversees the Conscious Kitchen program in local schools.
“The health consequences here are huge,” said Barbara Jellison, the executive director of food services for WCCUSD.
USDA cancels programs that help food programs buy from local farmers
The USDA announced March 10 that it was cancelling two programs that provided $1 billion per year for food banks and schools to purchase fruits, vegetables and other products from local farms and ranches.
The Food Bank of Contra Costa & Solano is losing $1.9 million in Local Food Purchasing Assistance (LFPA) funds. The food bank, which has an annual operating budget of about $30 million, receives about $4.3 million per year in federal funding to help provide 2.7 million meals to 65,000 households every month.
Food bank officials say they are currently authorized to spend LPFA funds through June, and they expect to lose the money starting in July.
The food bank uses this money to buy crops from local farmers and to fund operations that feed children and seniors nutritious produce.
Food bank officials said they also have been informed that some funding for their Emergency Food and Shelter Program (EFSP) have been frozen. This $160,000 grant is used to help support the food bank’s partner agencies.
In addition, they said they are concerned about the status of money they receive from CalFood, a program overseen by the California Association of Food Banks that helps local agencies purchase commodities from local farmers.
Last year, the food bank received $1.6 million from this source, but it, too, is slated to be reduced, CalMatters reported. For several years, when the state had a record surplus budget, it devoted millions of additional dollars to CalFood. Those boosts gave food banks about $60 million a year over the past three years; in Gov. Gavin Newsom’s proposed budget for the upcoming fiscal year that starts in July, that funding would revert to $8 million.
The end result could be that the food bank will hand out less food per person to make sure it has enough food to give at least something to everyone. It could also mean there’s less variety of produce to give out.
“As a food bank, we will need to find alternative funding sources to continue providing fresh, nutritious produce to our community,” said Sly. “We remain vigilant and will rely on the support of our community of individual donors more than ever.”
In particular, food bank officials say local farmers will be hurt by the USDA funding cuts.
“Farmers are reaching out daily, worried, and asking whether we can still purchase their produce and when contracts might be signed. Without these agreements, they face financial uncertainty,” Sly said.
WCCUSD’s organic food supply chain now at risk
The West Contra Costa Unified School District (WCCUSD) is also being affected.
The district serves 5 million meals per year to more than 30,000 students in 54 schools.
Jellison has worked diligently to provide quality food for all those meals. She says 100 percent of the produce coming into school cafeterias is now organic, mostly purchased from local farmers.
“We have made great connections with farmers who have never sold to schools before,” Jellison said.
She said these arrangements have allowed the district to save money on organic produce because it’s purchasing in bulk.
Jellison said it’s important for children to eat quality produce. The students also enjoy the organic fruits and vegetables more. That encourages them to eat a healthy amount of food and results in less food waste.
Jellison said organic watermelon has now replaced cookies as the students’ favorite lunchtime snack. Organic strawberries are also popular.
“Kids can taste the difference,” she said.
Jellison said she hopes she can continue to purchase organic food but may have to first look for other ways to reduce costs.
“We’re going to have to be very conscientious,” she said.
Shils said her organization’s Conscious Kitchen program is also getting squeezed by the USDA budget cuts.
The program helps the district’s food services operation “build a supply chain that’s organic,” Shils said.
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“We’re going to need to fight like hell to raise money.”
— Judi Shils, founder and executive director of Turning Green, which oversees the Conscious Kitchen program in local schools
They’ve done that by making sure that organic farmers are included on WCCUSD’S supplierslist.
“The system has just started to work better than it ever has,” she said.
The USDA cuts, she adds, will throw a wrench into that supply chain. Conscious Kitchen has already lost one $355,000 grant to help bolster the organic purchasing program. It also has lost the opportunity to apply for two other grants, one of which was worth $1 million.
She said the funding uncertainty makes it difficult for schools to maintain a supply chain.
“They’re making it hellacious for everybody but mostly for the children who now might not have healthy food,” Shils said.
She added that Conscious Kitchen and other programs will have to seek other sources of revenue.
“We’re going to need to fight like hell to raise money,” she said.
Free school meal program could be impacted
There are also proposed changes to the USDA’s Community Eligibility Provision (CEP) program, which allows the nation’s schools and districts with the highest poverty levels to offer free breakfasts and lunches to students. (All WCCUSD students are currently receiving free meals.)
Republican legislators in Congress are reportedly considering a plan to adjust which schools qualify as part of an attempt to cut $12 billion in school meal programs.
The Food Research and Action Center (FRAC) estimates this would cause 24,000 schools nationwide serving 12 million children to drop CEP programs.
The center adds that this adjustment would affect more than 4,000 schools in California serving more than 2 million children. FRAC officials estimate the changes would impact 44 WCCUSD schools and more than 22,000 children.
Jellison said these changes would have far-reaching consequences.
“They would be devastating,” she said. “It’ll be taking away from the highest need populations.”
Jellison said if these changes are made her food services department would have to seek more assistance from California Universal Meals, the state program that supplements schools that have implemented the federal school meals program.
“There would be more of a burden on the state,” she said.
Without extra funding, there is concern that some children might be sitting in class with empty stomachs.
Jellison said children who are hungry tend to be less successful academically and tend to develop more behavioral problems.
“This impacts more than just food services,” she said. “We see food services as an extension of the classroom.”
Beyond that, Jellison sees a societal moral obligation to make sure everybody has enough to eat.
“I don’t think anybody should go hungry,” she said.
