PROVIDENCE – At poverty relief organization Amos House, a busy month in the soup kitchen typically meant serving around 14,000 meals. And if the number of meals served month-over-month increased by 1,000, that was enough to raise alarm on increasing food insecurity.
But starting last March, need levels have shattered the usual expectations: That month, as pandemic-era Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits expired, Amos House served 20,000 meals — 6,000 more than what they would typically need to meet community need in a busy month.
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Since then, each month has seen multiple instances where soup kitchen staff serves more than 1,000 meals in a single day — a trend that was “unheard of … merely a year or two ago,” said Jessica Salter, chief philanthropy and communications officer at Amos House.
And the food pantry continues to serve far above its average levels, with around 18,000 meals provided in October, on top of nearly 13,000 pounds of packed or shelf-stable foods sent home through a distribution program.
In the past, “We saw some moderate increases” in need, Salter said. “But then those really did level off … Our numbers don’t [typically] have explosive growth in the way that we’ve seen this year, so it’s certainly been a very different experience for us.”
In fact, the organization is on track to serve around 200,000 meals by the end of the year, Salter said, a 60,000 increase from last year’s final figure of about 140,000.
Throughout the Ocean State, food banks, food pantries and soup kitchens are reporting similar concerns, said Andrew Schiff, CEO of the Rhode Island Community Food Bank.
The nonprofit, which provides food to 143 member agencies throughout Rhode Island, immediately saw a 20% surge in the number of people going to these organizations for assistance in March, Schiff said.
From Feb. to March 2023, that translated to a jump of 66,200 people served to 79,200.
“That was an increase that happened literally overnight,” Schiff said, also highlighting cuts to SNAP benefits. As of February, 88,000 Rhode Island households were enrolled in the benefits program, Schiff said, and on average, these households lost $155 in their monthly SNAP allocations when COVID-19 measures expired.
And while nonprofits have long observed rising food insecurity throughout the state, the recent increase also stood out as particularly troubling to Schiff.
“It’s very unusual for us to see this dramatic of an increase in such a short period of time,” Schiff said. “Going all the way back to the great recession in 2007 and 2008, there was a big increase in demand for food assistance with high unemployment, but … it went up steadily but gradually” over the following years.
While cuts to SNAP benefits stand as a clear culprit for the sudden increase, Schiff said, other factors are at play as well.
“It’s the increase in cost of food, but other basic expenses too,” Schiff said, such as rent and utilities. And with inflation still taking a heavy toll for customers at the grocery store, the cuts to SNAP benefits “came at the worst time,” he added.
“People are always going to pay their rent first, because they have to,” Schiff said. “We say that the rent eats first. Then as the month goes on, even households with SNAP benefits find that they are using up their benefits more quickly because of the high price of food.”
Salter also pointed to the state’s housing crisis as a key driver of food insecurity, calling the need for housing support “catastrophic right now.”
And housing and other basic support services likewise stand out as pressing concerns to Eileen Hayes, executive director of Amos House, in reducing food insecurity.
“Part of the answer is creating housing that is tied to employment, that is tied to a living wage that gives people an ability to sustain cost of living in all different areas of their lives,” Hayes said.
Establishing those support measures on a permanent basis comes down in part to political will, Hayes added, but she sees potential financial resources in unspent ARPA funding, and opportunities to bring in more federal dollars through Medicaid programming.
Compounding cuts to SNAP, Congress also opted not to renew the federal child tax credit program, which Schiff said also played an important role in reducing child poverty and hunger. And based on current federal proceedings, Schiff isn’t expecting either program to make a comeback any time soon.
“What we are hearing is that the arguments in Congress right now are about cutting SNAP benefits, rather than raising them,” he said, “so that would make things obviously even worse.”
Currently, nonprofit food providers are managing to meet community need: Amos House hasn’t turned anyone away, Salter said, and Schiff also hasn’t had R.I. Community Food Bank member organizations report this inability.
But Schiff doesn’t see improvement on the horizon any time soon, and “it’s going to be a very tough winter,” he said, with food providers, and those who rely on their services, left hoping to see grocery prices come down in the longer term.
And while Hayes sees some movement to establish more permanent support measures, the state still has a long way to go, she says.
“We’re a safety net for so many people in so many different ways,” Hayes said, “but often, we feel we’re just plugging the dam with bubblegum, and we need more long-term solutions.”
Jacquelyn Voghel is a PBN staff writer. You may reach her at Voghel@PBN.com.
