BENZIE COUNTY, Mich,. (WPBN/WGTU) – – Northern Michigan food banks are facing two challenges right now.
First, a growing need from the community they serve for more help, more food and second, with changes and cuts by the Trump Administration, a very uncertain future when it comes to their federal funding, or partnerships with agencies that get federal funding.
UpNorthLive looks into the impact that is already being felt and what food banks are asking from the people who are blessed enough to be able to help.
“I mean, we’ve had days where we’ve served over 70 families, so you know those were busy days,” said Diane Mahoney, Benzie Area Christian Neighbors.
And every year more and more neighbors have been turning to BACN for a little help.
“So we had almost 9,000 visits to our facility last year. The majority of those are for food assistance so families can come to us twice a month for emergency food support,” said Mahoney.
Last year, Benzie Area Christian Neighbors say a 23% growth in need of what they offer.
“Absolutely it’s what we’re built on neighbors helping neighbors,” said Mahoney.
This year isn’t shaping up to be much different.
‘It’s food. It is absolutely food is the number one need that we’re answering,” said Mahoney.
Keeping the shelves full and keeping up with the demand of people in need has never been easy or cheap, but BACN has relied on a collaboration with other nonprofits to maximize what they offer.
“Yes, so BACN is very much a community-supported organization. We do not receive federal funding directly however, we benefit tremendously from federally subsidized programs through our partners, through our coalitions and collaboratives with Feeding America and Food Rescue. So if they face funding cuts, that is absolutely going to trickle down to our organization,” said Mahoney.
And it’s starting to. The USDA, facing cuts from the White House, announcing that hundreds of thousands of pounds of food and tens of millions of dollars won’t be coming to Michigan in the next several months. Feeding America, one of the larger agencies impacted, explaining, “We oppose efforts to cut resources to these vitally needed programs. We also advocate for tax policies that strengthen charitable giving incentives, policies to encourage the donation of surplus wholesome food, and tax incentives…that help lift working families out of poverty.”
While BACN doesn’t directly get federal funds, they count on agencies who do, and without those, things get more challenging and expensive here.
“We receive about 15% of our food through those funding sources. So if that gets cut we are going to have to go out on the open market to grocery stores and purchase that food at retail cost versus you know, significantly reduced savings,” said Mahoney.
Like many organizations that rely on federal funds, BACN is having to make plans without a lot of information right now.
“We’ve tried to assess our risk because one of the challenges is no one knows. None of us that the information is conflicting. It comes out it’s very hard to determine what is fact and what is the impact it’s going to have on each organization,” said Mahoney.
They can’t be certain about their federal funding future.
“What kind of emergency is this is it a short-term one that’s going to resolve itself or are we looking at a new funding scenario for years into the future,” said Mahoney.
What they do know is that folks will show up here every day in need of food, and with the uncertainty out of Washington now, it may be the perfect time for everyone to embrace their mission of neighbors helping neighbors
“So we can support the organizations that we believe in locally so let’s keep our money here locally we help our neighbors we help one another people can donate by going to our website stopping by our office see what we do here in the building and making contributions online or in person at our office our website is benzybaconbacn.org so you can go online,” said Mahoney.
BACN says they have had multiple discussions about planning for the future and they are confident that they will be around for another 40 years to serve the community, but like many organizations and nonprofits across a broad spectrum of services, they just don’t know how long the cuts and freezes will be in place and that makes it very difficult to make long term plans.
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