FRESNO-CLOVIS, Calif. (KFSN) — Community colleges in the Central Valley pride themselves on being able to provide for their students beyond their education.<\/p>\n
“This right here is one of the greatest things that I think that a campus should possibly have,” Brandi Smith said as she showed off the shelves inside the Crush Pantry.<\/p>\n
Smith is a full-time student at Clovis Community College and also an employee at the Crush Pantry, a free grocery resource for students.<\/p>\n
Fellow student-employee Karinna Tate joined the pantry to make an impact on her community.<\/p>\n
“The fact that we are able to provide food to these students and see them light up because a lot of them are dependent on this, was what initially got me into this field,” Tate said.<\/p>\n
But as this historic government shutdown carries on, Basic Needs Director Bonita Gomez says stocking shelves is getting harder, saying, “Unfortunately, from the time that I started to log in to the time that I logged out and submitted the order, half of the items were gone.”<\/p>\n
Many junior colleges in the Valley rely heavily on the local food banks to fill their student pantries.<\/p>\n
With the lack of federal funding, colleges are now forced to turn to their communities for support.<\/p>\n
“Help feed these students, help feed these families, there should be no reason why anybody should go without,” said Smith, pleading with the public for help.<\/p>\n
Across town, Fresno City’s Ram Pantry is fighting to keep up with nearly a thousand students in need of support.<\/p>\n
“We’re serving about 1,000 a day who really rely on our free grocery program,” Dr. Kizzy Lopez said.<\/p>\n
Dr. Lopez is the Basic Needs Director at Fresno City.<\/p>\n
She says the work on food assistance began long before food aid programs were targeted.<\/p>\n
On Monday, the Trump administration announced partial funding of SNAP, but the specifics of their proposal are still unclear.<\/p>\n
With the holidays on the horizon, Dr. Lopez says Fresno City isn’t taking any chances.<\/p>\n
“We’ve been working together to try to curate a list of available resources, not only in Fresno but surrounding counties, and pop-up pantries and food distribution, specific to November,” Dr. Lopez said.<\/p>\n
Both Fresno City College and Clovis Community College are accepting donations in person and online.<\/p>\n
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