By Mary Hennigan for The Arkansas Advocate.
Broadcast version by Freda Ross for Arkansas News Service reporting for The Arkansas Advocate-Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation-Public News Service Collaboration.

As a Fayetteville food pantry volunteer and someone who supplements trips to the grocery store with local assistance methods, the way Jen Cole experiences the struggle for food access is twofold.

While Cole, 55, forfeits her favorites of fresh mushrooms, pomegranates and herbal teas at the grocery store, she also helps serve people she said she wouldn’t expect to see at the food pantry: nurses and firefighters.

“If a car breaks down, if you have an illness — that’s it. You’re in the food pantry line,” Cole said. “But you’re working poor, so you can’t afford to miss your job to get in that line. That’s a huge problem.”

When the Advocate first interviewed her in July, Cole earned a minimal monthly income as a part-time chef for a local homelessness-assistance organization in addition to funds she received for her disability, a heart defect that restricts her ability to work. In total, Cole stretched about $1,600 each month among medical costs, rent, her phone bill and groceries.

Cole became unemployed on July 26, about two weeks after her initial interview with the Advocate. After receiving a letter from the Arkansas Department of Human Services that said she would lose her Medicaid insurance because of the income she made at her $11/hour, part-time job, Cole chose to prioritize her health and leave.

Cole later told the Advocate she was heartbroken to leave her job, but there was no way she could give up her health insurance with her disability. Now, instead of spending a portion of her income at the grocery store, Cole said she will rely on government assistance and her local food pantry.

“I’m barely going to be able to shop,” she said.

Cole, who lives alone in Fayetteville, was one of approximately 560,000 Arkansas households that live below the ALICE (Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed) threshold of financial survival, according to United for ALICE, a nonprofit composed of United Way organizations and other groups dedicated to research and solutions about poverty.

Nearly one in three households in Washington County, where Cole lives, are considered ALICE and struggle to afford basic needs like food, according to United for ALICE. Statewide, 47% of Arkansas’ 1.2 million households fell below the ALICE threshold.

The ALICE population’s ability to access food is also likely connected to Arkansas’ high rate of food insecurity. Ranked second in the nation, more than 567,000 Arkansans experienced food insecurity and struggled to find access to healthy food in 2022, according to Feeding America data released in May.

This combination of factors, as well as rising housing costs, has led Sylvia Blain, CEO of the Arkansas Hunger Relief Alliance, to believe more people are falling into the ALICE designation.

“When it comes to food insecurity, if you can’t raise your income, then you’re going to have to limit the amount of food you’re purchasing,” Blain said.

The ALICE population may buy in bulk, use pick-up grocery services to avoid in-store impulse buys and steer clear of name brands to keep their bills affordable. They may also favor inexpensive ready-to-eat meals, though these often have a higher starch content and can lead to health problems, Blain said.

‘Time is money’

A person’s grocery budget can often be the first place where changes are made when money gets tight, said Grant Williams, executive director of Potluck Food Rescue.

“I think [food] is the only budget item that’s relatively within your control,” Williams said. “The reason people have cars is because they need transportation; gas is something out of their control. Rent is something as well mostly out of their control. When you stack up everything you have, you can’t really negotiate on food.”

Other contributing factors, like transportation costs to travel out of a food desert for nutritious food — and the time it takes to do so — can keep grocery budgets somewhat rigid, Blain said.

“You can buy beans and rice instead of steak and carrots, but you have to have access to beans and rice,” Blain said. “So if you’re living in a food desert and you’re having to travel to purchase those foods, then you’re adding to the bottom line. … Time is money. Our ALICE folks work two and three jobs.”

The Arkansas Hunger Relief Alliance in 2022 found that 62 of the state’s 75 counties have an identified food desert, which means residents have to travel more than one mile to access fresh, nutritious food in an urban setting and more than 10 miles in a rural setting.

Blain, who said she was once considered part of the ALICE population as a single mom juggling two jobs and college coursework, remembers the stress of staying up late to plan meals and work through her budget.

“It took a lot of time, it took the whole family and even putting responsibilities on children,” Blain said. “I wasn’t necessarily proud of the fact that [my oldest son] was making us dinner.”

Cole said she scours the local free refrigerator program for fresh vegetables, receives a few options a week from Meals on Wheels and hits her preferred food pantry once a month. Cole often scores discarded vegetables like eggplants and zucchini that, as a trained chef, she knows how to incorporate into her meals easily.

When the food pantries provide Cole with more food than she can eat, like when they supplied her with a “gigantic rack of ribs,” she cooks for her neighbors in Hillcrest Towers, a public housing apartment complex.

“We’re going to spread the love, and I will share with my food-insecure neighbors,” Cole said. “It’s a share-the-love thing. … There’s no way I’m eating all those ribs, but I’m going to cook them because they were given to me.”

Cole doesn’t own a car, and she said she will occasionally accrue additional expenses by using ride-share services, like Uber, to get around. She said she uses public transportation often and is lucky to have access to a route that gets to her food pantry.

“But not everybody’s going to be on that route,” Cole said. “We need more bus routes, and I feel like that would help us get [access] to some of the food.”

Stigma

When members of the ALICE population make it to the food pantry, they can be plagued by a stigma that leads them to believe their request means taking food away from someone else, Blain said.

While Blain said this is a misconception, Cole said she’s experienced these thoughts herself.

“I almost feel bad using [the pantry] because their need has gone up so bad, but they remind me I’m a human too, and I need food too,” Cole said.

The same thoughts are true for some members of the ALICE population who visit the faith-based organization The Helping Hand of Greater Little Rock, said executive director Gayle Priddy.

Priddy runs a team of volunteers and a small paid staff who help residents in Pulaski County in Central Arkansas receive food. Each month, anyone with a valid ID can visit the organization in exchange for a bag of groceries. During a trip to the operation in June, bags were bursting with bread, cereal, proteins and produce.

“We have a few people who are embarrassed by it and don’t want to admit it,” Priddy said. “I would say it’s less than 1% — when you start asking them about their income and how they’re doing, they’d rather not take the food than answer those questions.”

Fears of rejection and the unknown are also strong for people within the ALICE population, Blain said.

“If you apply for food stamps, and you’re turned down because you have more than $2,000 in the bank, then you might not ask again because that was hard enough and then you got turned down,” Blain said. “…A lot of people we would define as ALICE are not accustomed to asking for help at pantries. They don’t understand the system…and that lack of knowledge would keep them away.”

Room for improvement

Arkansas has hundreds of food-assistance programs statewide, including regional food banks and local food pantries. The Arkansas Hunger Relief Alliance works in partnership with these organizations, as well as advocating for better access.

In March 2023, state Sen. Jonathan Dismang, R-Beebe, brought forward legislation to raise the resource limit for SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program), commonly known as food stamps. Dismang argued the existing asset limits discouraged poor Arkansans from saving enough money to become financially stable because they might lose reliable access to food in the process.

While Dismang’s initial proposal sought to raise the resource limit to $12,500, the bill was amended to $5,500, up from its previous $2,250 for most families. The bill is now Act 675 of 2023.

Blain said raising the limit further would be key to helping the ALICE population because they are often the ones who do not qualify for assistance.

Feeding kids at school is another important factor to the multi-pronged effort of solving hunger, Blain said. Free at-school meals take some pressure off families who struggle financially. 

This summer, Arkansas was one of three dozen states to participate in a federally funded meal program called the Summer Electronic Benefit Transfer. Focused on feeding children while school is out, eligible students received $120 on a card that can be used at participating grocery stores and farmers market booths.

Blain also called on state officials to incentivize local farmers to grow and sell produce locally, year around.

“We’re missing a whole section of our food system,” Blain said. “One of the things that at the state level we could do is incentivize that level of economic development. It will only strengthen our agriculture industry."


Mary Hennigan wrote this article for The Arkansas Advocate.


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North Dakota is expected to rejoin the debate over whether all school children, regardless of their family income, should have access to no-cost meals.

Universal lunch programs have been adopted by nearly 10 states, including neighboring Minnesota. A broad coalition of organizations gathered Thursday to push for adding North Dakota to the list. The federal government funds free or reduced-cost meals to income-eligible students. States with universal policies cover the remaining expenses so all kids eat free.

Michelle Wagner, child nutrition director for Bismarck Public Schools and legislative chair for the North Dakota School Nutrition Association, said working in a school cafeteria has opened her eyes about the need.

"As a food service director, we see firsthand that many of these students depend on school meals as their primary source of nutrition," Wagner explained.

The coalition said one in three North Dakota children relies on the Great Plains Food Bank, and many do not meet school meal eligibility requirements. North Dakota lawmakers temporarily boosted meal eligibility last session but advocates said wider permanent access is needed. A likely bill sponsor said there appears to be bipartisan support but expects pushback over cost concerns, even with a budget surplus.

Coalition members argued this type of move works as a tax cut, estimating North Dakota families would save more than $850 per child each year.

Robin Nelson, CEO of the Boys & Girls Club of the Red River Valley, said by putting kids in a better position to learn, the state would also be able to address workforce shortages down the road.

"If I were a company that was trying to recruit employees, I would use this for anybody to move to the state," Nelson suggested.

Statewide polling in North Dakota has shown strong public support for expanded school meals. In Minnesota, policy observers said the state's program, approved in 2023, is proving to be popular but demand has been strong, elevating costs. Those behind North Dakota's effort said they hope lawmakers get a full scope of what is needed when they begin debating the issue.


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Congressional efforts to avoid a government shutdown could extend funding for SNAP, the program formerly known as food stamps. And if the continuing resolution introduced in the U.S. House this week is passed, SNAP participants won't go hungry if they fall victim to electronic theft.

Carmen Mooradian, senior public policy manager with Hunger Free Colorado, said the resolution extends protections from practices - such as skimming data from EBT cards, which function like debit cards - through September of 2028.

"This is when a device is placed on a point-of-sale terminal, and it's used to take that account information, and to clone it into a new card, that is then used to drain that person's account," Mooradian said.

Electronic theft protections were set to expire this Friday. Nearly one in five families with children in Colorado have gone without food because they can't afford it, and advocates are urging lawmakers to improve emergency food assistance programs by removing barriers such as additional work requirements; getting more eligible people enrolled; allowing participants to make their own healthy food choices; and increasing benefit levels to keep up with rising costs.

The minimum SNAP benefit is currently $23 per month, and the average SNAP benefit is $6 a day. Mooradian said lessons learned during the COVID public-health emergency show what's possible when benefits are increased.

"It can actually protect against food insecurity. People have access to healthier foods, because they can afford healthier foods," Mooradian added. "So, we need to make sure that we are moving toward more adequate benefits. "

Sen. Michael Bennet, D-CO, has introduced a bill that would allow people with disabilities or working multiple jobs to use SNAP to buy hot prepared foods at grocery stores. Mooradian said it's also important for lawmakers to remove additional work and other requirements for the 40% of community college students experiencing hunger.

"There are a lot of restrictions on student eligibility right now that make it harder for students to access this program. When students aren't focusing on having to feed themselves, they are actually able to do better in school," Mooradian added.

Several federal programs may face budget cuts as the new administration proposes sweeping actions to reduce the federal debt.

Advocates for the safety-net programs in Tennessee said cuts would jeopardize food access, health insurance and essential services for tens of thousands of people.

Signe Anderson, senior director of nutrition advocacy at the Tennessee Justice Center, said key decisions early next year will significantly affect funding for Medicaid, as well as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly known as food stamps. She pointed out on average, about 750,000 Tennesseans per month receive SNAP benefits.

"Tennesseans will have less access to health care and to food," Anderson projected. "Programs that are in place now that offer health care to Tennesseans will become more limited - and the same with the SNAP program, will become more limited."

The Tennessee Justice Center hosts a free webinar today at 11:30 a.m. to discuss how groups across the country are organizing responses to potential cuts and their impacts on communities. More than 1.4 million Tennesseans are enrolled in Medicaid.

Anderson noted another federal program providing summer meals to hundreds of thousands of Tennessee children will expire unless Gov. Bill Lee renews it by Jan. 1, which he has indicated he does not plan to do.

The Summer EBT program provides families with $40 a month during the summer, for extra help paying for food when kids are out of school.

"DHS reported to USDA that nearly 700,000 children participated this past summer," Anderson emphasized. "Tennessee has been very, very successful in rolling out the program, and we're one of the only southeast states last year that participated."

Anderson stressed advocates for maintaining Summer EBT have delivered more than 2,200 signatures on petitions to the governor's office. She added more than $78 million in Summer EBT benefits also boost the local economy through grocery store spending.


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