New food stamp cuts hit poor families hard during holidays

Carol Forsloff---

Interfaith dinner in Washington County

While American families prepared for Thanksgiving and Christmas holiday feasts, the Food Pantry and other groups want everyone to know that people are going hungry every day in the United States as cuts in the food stamp program began just as the holidays approach.

In addition, the Republican lawmakers, as they sought to help the banks modify their investments in a fashion that might risk FDIC deposits, the same lawmakers voted to water down school lunches.  Less food and nourishment will mean more children hungry, even when food is available, but not the kind or amounts needed for growing bodies.

In Illinois with more than 2 million low-income Illinois residents receiving food stamps, many people will be impacted by the benefit cuts that are taking place today. Of that number, just in the State of Illinois, 349,000 are seniors and 886,000 are children.

According to the Agriculture Department, the benefit cuts will break down to $36 a month less for a family of four. The cuts have taken place as the 2009 stimulus temporary increase in food stamps dollars expires this week. This leaves millions of people who depend on food stamps with even less support.

Churches all over the country, and other charitable groups, are trying to make up for the shortfall in food people are experiencing. Governor Pat Quinn of Illinois notes this year will be particularly hard for many families during the holidays.

Quinn says, “I feel that those cutbacks in food stamps was very shortsighted, and they need to be reversed, and we don’t want to see further cutbacks in food stamps,” Quinn said. “In whatever town or whatever neighborhood. we want to make sure we are there to help feed the hungry.”

Kate Maehr, the executive director and CEO of the depository in Chicago, agrees the need is at an all-time high.

“One in six people don’t know where they are going to get their next meal,” Maehr said. “The challenge is, you don’t walk down the street and immediately know who the hungry person is. It might be your neighbor it might be a child in your child’s classroom, but its one in six people here in Cook County.”

An estimated 47 million Americans will feel the effects of the cuts.

In Washington County every year, as in other locations, churches host an Interfaith gathering for the purpose of raising money for homeless families. Like many charitable religious organizations, people are volunteering, even during these cold, stormy days, to work at shelters and continue to bring attention to the plight of the homeless and hungry.