Dallas resident Ricardo Rodriguez waited for a DART bus Friday with a cart of produce, meat and canned goods from CitySquare’s food pantry, a service he’s used twice a month for four years to put food on his table.
“I eat most days,” said Rodriguez, who must ride the DART with his food to South Oak Cliff. “I don’t have a car so sometimes I have to carry it all by myself. When I do, I don’t get as much.”
Rodriguez lives in the second-most food-insecure state in the nation behind Arkansas, according to an October report from the U.S. Department of Agriculture that averaged prevalence rates from 2020 through 2022.
During the three-year survey period, an average of 15.5% of households in Texas reported they lacked consistent access to affordable and healthy food, a 2.4% increase from 2017-2019.
And the North Texas Food Bank reports that Dallas County has the 4th-highest number of food-insecure children in the nation.
The financial impact from the pandemic and inflation have strained households tremendously, said Paul McFarland, Area Commander of the Salvation Army of North Texas. That’s pushing more families to using food pantry services to offset rising costs.
Food insecure households are often forced to eat cheaper but less healthy meals – or skip meals altogether. And food access issues are made worse by racial disparities in food security prevalent across North Texas.
Texas is one of six states — along with Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Oklahoma and South Carolina — whose prevalence for food insecurity between 2020 and 2022 was higher than the national average of 12.8%.
Food insecurity rates have climbed nationwide from 10.2% in 2021 and 10.5% in 2020 – with households with children reporting higher rates of hunger.
According to the USDA, children are usually shielded from the disrupted eating patterns and reduced food intake that characterize very low food security.
But significantly more households with very low food security in 2022 reported that children were hungry, skipped a meal, or did not eat for a whole day because there was not enough money for food, the report said.
“We are absolutely heartbroken by the increase in food insecurity numbers across the country and in our state,” said Stacie Sanchez-Hare, director of No Kid Hungry Texas. “Families need stability, and children deserve the ability to play, grow up healthy, and be lifted up out of poverty.”
SNAP program
In October, between 500,000 to 1 million of the nation’s lowest-income adults were cut off from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program following the program’s work-reporting requirement returning after being temporarily suspended during the pandemic, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
“2.3 million children were lifted out of poverty when lawmakers implemented temporary emergency SNAP allotments and permanently increased maximum benefit amounts,” Sanchez-Hare said. “There is strong evidence that nutritional assistance programs work, and we urge Congress to protect and strengthen smart policies such as those put in place during the pandemic to support the 3 million Texans who rely on them.
Food insecurity rates in 2022 were significantly higher than the national average for households with children (17.3%), households with children headed by a single female (33.1%), and women living alone (15.1%).
And soon SNAP – once called food stamps – could face more scrutiny through the farm bill from Republicans in Congress who’ve been pushing for stricter work requirements to receive aid.
A hungry North Texas
The North Texas Food Bank and its network of over 500 food pantries has responded to an unprecedented level of need in its fiscal year between July 2022 and June this year.
The food bank and its partners provided more than 144 million meals to its 13-county service area – the most annual meals ever and a more than 5% increase from the year prior.
In the 13 counties served by the North Texas Food Bank, 1 in 8 people face food insecurity, with Black and Hispanic households feeling the need the most; 22% of Black residents, 1 in 7 Hispanic residents and 1 in 14 white residents experience food insecurity.
The Salvation Army of North Texas has seen the number of first-time food pantry clients increase by an average of 26% from January to July of this year, according to McFarland.
“Remember there for a while eggs were 7 bucks a dozen,” he said. “That’s kind of leveled out but what it hasn’t done is gone back to prices before 2020.”
In the Carr P. Collins Social Service Center’s zip code – 75235 – the food insecurity rate is a high 17.9%, according to Feeding America data. The service center’s food pantry feeds about 200 households on any given day, McFarland said.
To combat a rise in hunger, the North Texas Food Bank gave a grant to The Salvation Army, one of the top 10 largest partners of the North Texas Food Bank, to purchase a new distribution truck that can support food distribution at a dramatically higher scale.
Since the new truck has been in operation, delivery frequency, total pounds of food, and retail pickups have all increased.
“We simply could not do what we do in the fight against hunger without the support of feeding partners like The Salvation Army,” said Trisha Cunningham, President and CEO of the North Texas Food Bank. “Our grant program provides needed resources to our partner agencies allowing them to serve more people in their community. We are grateful for the commitment and dedication of The Salvation Army to hunger relief in our community.”