FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) — The federal government shutdown is now forcing some Valley families to face going hungry.<\/p>\n
At risk – is the federally funded— Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program also known as SNAP.<\/p>\n
If the shutdown continues, officials said SNAP benefits will not be distributed to its recipients.<\/p>\n
SNAP, sometimes known as food stamps, offers monthly benefits to help low-income families buy food.<\/p>\n
With those funds now at risk, local organizations such as the Poverello House in Fresno say there’s a major concern.<\/p>\n
“If there’s a pause on benefits or even a change that’s coming in the new year, the reality is we will see more and more people at the Poverello House every day,” said Poverello CEO Zack Darrah. <\/p>\n
The Poverello House feeds roughly 1,000 people a day at Poverello. He expects that number to double by next month.<\/p>\n
And even with the Poverello House telethon being a huge success on Thursday, Darrah said they will have to stretch their dollars and donations.<\/p>\n
“How do we create meals out of this that can go to the community for those who are hungry? Certainly, that saving installers, but we are doing everything in our power to make us as efficient as possible so that we can meet the need every day,” said Darrah. <\/p>\n
The Central California food bank meets the needs of hundreds of thousands of people who also rely on SNAP benefits.<\/p>\n
“We anticipate a huge influx in need in the coming weeks and months until the government reopens,” said Central California Co-CEO Kym Dildine.<\/p>\n
Governor Gavin Newsom has deployed the National Guard under the leadership of the Department of Social Services to assist food banks across the state.<\/p>\n
Dildine from the Central California Food Bank said historically, the food bank has not used the National Guard for help and Dildine hopes they won’t need to now.<\/p>\n
“Really trying to be sensitive about the possibility of a National Guard presence. Chilling the effect and coming and seeking services they need,” said Dildine. <\/p>\n
The CEO has also recognized that federal workers who were laid off are also seeking the food bank’s services.<\/p>\n
For ways to help the Poverello House, click here<\/a>. To offer help to the Central California Food Bank, click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n Copyright \u00a9 2025 KFSN-TV. All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) — The federal government shutdown is now forcing some Valley families to face going hungry.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":22678,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[17924,17920,17922,9480,4703,6155,3400,14608,112,114,113,6103,17923,6113,17921,2806,15734,3304,14609,294,17919],"class_list":["post-22677","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fresno","tag-17924","tag-benefit-distribution","tag-central-california-food-bank","tag-donations","tag-federal-government-shutdown","tag-federal-workers","tag-food-insecurity","tag-food-stamps","tag-fresno","tag-fresno-headlines","tag-fresno-news","tag-hunger","tag-increased-need","tag-layoffs","tag-low-income-families","tag-national-guard","tag-poverello-house","tag-snap","tag-supplemental-nutrition-assistance-program","tag-timely","tag-valley-families"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22677","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=22677"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22677\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22678"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22677"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22677"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22677"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}