CT Foodshare grapples with less food for community amid federal funding cuts

The state’s largest food bank is in critical need of donations after losing a significant volume of food supply  from the federal government. 

Jacob Jakubowski, CEO and President of Connecticut Foodshare, the state’s largest food bank, said they were notified months ago that they would lose out on 34 truckloads from the federal government's program, The Emergency Food Assistance Program (TFAP) 

“It's about 1.4 million pounds of food and if we were to buy the equivalent of that food, it's about $1.7 million,” Jakubowksi said. 

He added it's been difficult to manage the shortage of food donations and essentially means less product for customers. 

“If you go to one of our pantries, or one of our mobile food share distributions, you’ll end up walking away with less food than you would’ve one or two years ago,” said Jakubowski. 

Jakubowski believes the only solution at the moment is to increase revenue from the state to CT Foodshare, amid the uncertainty from the federal government. 

“We have asked the state legislature for $10 million in each of the two years of the upcoming budget. The latest round of the budget had $2.5 million in it for year one and $5 million for year two. That's definitely a step in the right direction but it still doesn't get us where we need to be.”

Jakubowski also spoke about the possible negative effects to benefit holders and local economies if the federal government makes benefit or eligibility cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).

“Most grocery stores anywhere from 10-15% of their sales are through the SNAP program so it’s not just a cut to individuals, it's a cut to all those businesses that benefit from the SNAP program,” said Jakubowski. 

In New Haven, Steve Werlin, the executive director of Downtown Evening Soup Kitchen (DESK) said they have been feeling the trickle down effect specifically with less donations coming from CT Foodshare. 

“We get about ⅔ of our food from CT Foodshare and we’ve been noticing a major drop especially in fresh produce, meats and dairy recently.”

He said the instability of food deliveries has impacted their ability to plan the meals they will serve their clients. 

"The food is coming in, but it's not enough and so we're having to scramble."

Werlin said this has pushed them to seek out their partners more often such as Big Y, Target and Stop & Shop but their options are also limited.

He added one possible solution is creating community-focused food drives.

“Just a pasta drive, just frozen meat, just dairy so we can get more of those staple items that we haven’t been able to get from CT Foodshare.”