recipients<\/a> are families with young children, older people living below the poverty line, or disabled. They receive, on average, about $189 a month, or $6.22 a day, to help pay for nutrition. Roughly 4 in 10 (38%) of SNAP clients work, but earn wages low enough to qualify for federal help to buy groceries.<\/p>\nAnother 6.74 million mothers and newborns and toddlers \u2013 including more than 62,000 in Orange County \u2013 get help from WIC in any given month. Federal data shows that WIC feeds more than 4 in 10 (41%) of all newborns in the United States.<\/p>\n
County data shows similar patterns for local beneficiaries of both programs.<\/p>\n
Suspending SNAP and WIC could be devastating in Orange County, setting off a chain of need that could strain an already-fraying safety net that helps lower-income people stay fed. Many local families who use CalFresh or WIC already seek some free food to supplement their diets each month, and they\u2019ll be forced to turn even more to a network of more than 500 food pantries and food banks spread throughout the county.<\/p>\n
Some people who run those food programs said Thursday that they\u2019re bracing for a run on supply that could drag on through the holiday season.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe don\u2019t know if it\u2019s going to be two days, two weeks or two months. We\u2019re preparing for anything,\u201d said Claudia Bonilla Keller, chief executive of Second Harvest Food Bank, which collects and distributes food to about 380 food pantries and others throughout Orange County.<\/p>\n
Keller added that even if the Senate approves emergency funding for SNAP, her organization has already launched a plan to make more food available in early November.<\/p>\n
Food-oriented nonprofits already have seen an upturn because of the shutdown. About 10,000 federal workers live in Orange County, and though many are furloughed \u2013 meaning they\u2019re not working while they\u2019re not being paid \u2013 more than 300 TSA workers continue to work at John Wayne Airport without pay.<\/p>\n
Keller said that a food pantry opened this week in the TSA employee lounge at John Wayne.<\/p>\n
\u201cThose are people who are working close to round the clock, and don\u2019t have time to get help, but they aren\u2019t getting a paycheck,\u201d Keller said. \u201cIf they need help, we need to provide it.\u201d<\/p>\n
People who actually use CalFresh described any suspension of that assistance in dire terms.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s scary, man. Really scary,\u201d said Javier Ibarra of Santa Ana. \u201cIf they cut that off, I can\u2019t say how I\u2019ll get what my kids need.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ibarra, 51, said that when he started using CalFresh and food from food banks earlier this year, it was the first time since his childhood that he\u2019d sought any kind of public assistance. He usually works more than full-time in gardening and home construction but, in recent months, he\u2019s declined some work opportunities because he\u2019s fearful of immigration enforcement.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have a Green Card. I\u2019m legal. But if they pick you up and take you away, it can take a long time to get back. And that\u2019s not OK for my family either.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ibarra said the CalFresh cards he uses at grocery stores, and food boxes that his girlfriend picks up from a pantry near their home, are essential for a family that includes the couple plus a teenage son and two younger children.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt all helps,\u201d he said. \u201cI can\u2019t believe that this might happen.\u201d<\/p>\n
Any cutback to CalFresh also could have a broader impact on businesses in Orange County. Virtually every penny allocated for food assistance is spent in the recipient\u2019s community. And a recent study from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities<\/a> found that each CalFresh dollar spent generates about $1.50 for the broader economy.<\/p>\nTran, from the Social Services Agency, said Orange County spends about $62 million a month on CalFresh.<\/p>\n
\u201cAbout 98 to 99 percent of CalFresh benefits are spent in the local economy, at mom and pop stores selling food and fresh produce,\u201d Tran said.<\/p>\n
He also noted that the income level to receive CalFresh in Orange County is about $32,000 for a family of four.<\/p>\n
\u201cEven though $62 million a month sounds like a lot of money, it\u2019s all going toward families who are very needy,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Roughly 310,000 people in Orange County \u2013 including 94,000 children \u2013 soon could be scrambling for food, as…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":20219,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[163,165,164,7,1752,6103,1071,100,611,136],"class_list":{"0":"post-20218","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-anaheim","8":"tag-anaheim","9":"tag-anaheim-headlines","10":"tag-anaheim-news","11":"tag-california","12":"tag-congress","13":"tag-hunger","14":"tag-local-government","15":"tag-news","16":"tag-orange-county","17":"tag-top-stories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20218","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20218"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20218\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20219"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20218"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20218"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20218"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}