\u201cI really feel like I\u2019m going to be burnt out. I feel like it\u2019s going to be hard on me because I am a single mom,\u201d she said on a recent afternoon. \u201cI have to push through, but I am going to be overwhelmed.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Thursday, however, Crawford was surprised to learn that the $445 payment had showed up on her card. Soon after, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced that, because of a court victory,<\/a> \u201cfood benefits are now beginning to flow back to California families\u201d \u2014 at least temporarily. <\/p>\n Crawford is one of roughly 5.5 million statewide who depend on this food aid \u2014 known in California as CalFresh \u2014 and one of 42 million people nationwide. In recent weeks, this group has been caught in the crosshairs of a political battle that has shifted from Congress to courtrooms amid a federal shutdown that has now lasted more than five weeks. <\/p>\n As of early Friday, two federal judges had ordered the U.S. Department of Agriculture to use billions of dollars in contingency funding to continue providing SNAP support \u2014 the reason Crawford and many others nationwide received their full benefits Thursday. On Friday the Trump administration asked a federal appeals court to block one of those orders<\/a>. The appeals court let the order stand, and then late Friday the Trump administration succeeded in persuading the Supreme Court<\/a> to block the judicial rulings and \u2014 at least temporarily \u2014 withhold food benefits from millions of Americans.<\/p>\n Many recipients in California already have their payments, but the legal drama late Friday may add to their anxieties. Many were already improvising, and may have to do so again. <\/p>\n Zuir Crawford, 20, loads groceries bought using gift cards supplied by Riverside City College.<\/p>\n (Gina Ferazzi \/ Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n In Crawford\u2019s case, she already juggles college coursework, picks up shifts as an UberEats driver and cares for her 1-year-old. When she learned her food aid would be delayed this month, she made a plan: She would drop two classes and then pick up additional work as a caregiver so she and her son could afford to eat. She would use that money to supplement the support she is receiving from her school and community.<\/p>\n Even with food aid, she depends on food pantries to help her obtain items such as canned ravioli, Rice-a-Roni and frozen dinners for the last two weeks of the month.<\/p>\n Single parents could be hit especially hard by the delay in food benefits. Nationwide, single-adults make up nearly two-thirds<\/a> (62%) of all SNAP households with children, according to the USDA. In California, almost a quarter of single working parents<\/a> (23.2%) are in poverty, according to the Public Policy Institute of California.<\/p>\n Households headed by single mothers are especially vulnerable amid a worsening gender wage gap and rising costs for education, housing and child care, said Jesseca Boyer, vice president of policy and strategic initiatives for the Institute for Women\u2019s Policy Research. \u201cAll of those factors require a single mother to stretch their already limited dollars even further,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n In the Bay Area city of Mountain View, Abigail Villavicencio usually gets between $500 and $700 each month loaded onto her CalFresh cards, she said. It depends on her fluctuating income delivering food for apps such as Uber Eats. A single mom with three children, she first qualified for SNAP in 2021, and at that time was able to stretch the money to cover groceries for an entire month.<\/p>\n \u201cBut over the last year, it hasn\u2019t been enough. I spend $500 in 2 weeks. I noticed prices were going up,\u201d she said, and her weekly grocery trip often now costs $200 to $300. \u201cI have two weeks when I have to figure out what to do.\u201d <\/p>\n Villavicencio said she augments her benefits by collecting donated food at her son\u2019s school twice a month.<\/p>\n The last few weeks have been particularly hurtful, she said, when she sees commenters on social media deriding food stamp recipients as \u201clazy.\u201d She notes that she has to show her bank accounts every six months to qualify for CalFresh. For the past three years, she\u2019s been home with her twin daughters as they went through intensive behavior therapy for autism.<\/p>\n News of the delayed SNAP benefits gutted her carefully calibrated food plan. She dipped into her savings for the last grocery trip and bought enough to make meals she could sell to construction workers to earn a few extra dollars.<\/p>\n Now that her twin daughters are in kindergarten, she\u2019s also been searching for more consistent work \u2014 but it\u2019s been challenging, she said, to find one that will allow her to drop off and pick up her children from school.<\/p>\n Holding her dog Bear, Zuir Crawford, 20 fears losing her SNAP benefits because of the federal government shutdown. \u201cI really feel like I\u2019m going to be burnt out. I feel like it\u2019s going to be hard on me because I am a single mom,\u201d she said on a recent afternoon. \u201cI have to push through, but I am going to be overwhelmed.\u201d<\/p>\n (Gina Ferazzi \/ Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n As for Crawford, she said she experienced \u201ctrauma after trauma\u201d growing up, bouncing between homes in Los Angeles and Riverside counties. She has sought stability since becoming a teen mom to her son, whom she affectionately calls Baby Z.<\/p>\n She is in her second semester at Riverside City College, where she is taking prerequisite courses to pursue a nursing career. She makes \u201clittle to nothing\u201d driving for Uber Eats, she said, \u201cbut it\u2019s enough for me to at least put gas in my tank.\u201d<\/p>\n Without the financial support of her family or a partner, she relies on a patchwork of government programs.<\/p>\n Two months ago, she, her son and her fluffy white dog Bear moved into a one-bedroom apartment that she obtained through a county housing program for the homeless. She uses the nearly $900 a month she receives through CalWorks, a state welfare program, to cover her rent, utilities and phone bill. Along with CalFresh, she gets a monthly allotment of healthy food through the Women, Infants and Children program.<\/p>\n She said she\u2019s also sustained by her Christian faith. She attends regular Bible studies and uses a portion of her food budget to make meals for the homeless.<\/p>\n Inside the college\u2019s Basic Needs Resource Center on Wednesday afternoon, Crawford filled a black basket with peanut butter, jelly, oatmeal, a can of pozole and hygiene products. While students can typically access the pantry every two weeks, they can collect staples once a week during the shutdown, a volunteer explained.<\/p>\n Crawford is in her second semester at Riverside City College, where she is taking prerequisite courses to pursue a nursing career.<\/p>\n (Gina Ferazzi \/ Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n As a community college student and single parent receiving public assistance<\/a>, she is also eligible for additional support including meal vouchers and grocery gift cards.<\/p>\n With SNAP beneficiaries becoming pawns in the shutdown fight, she said she\u2019s grateful for the public assistance, which she views as a \u201cstepping stone\u201d to a more financially secure life.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s not my fault that I was born into the family I was born into,\u201d she said later that day, as she sliced and spiced chicken and steamed vegetables for a low-cost meal. \u201cI can\u2019t control that. But what I can control is my outcome. And I know that if I keep on working hard, if I keep on persevering through all the hardships, I\u2019m going to be OK.\u201d<\/p>\n Zuir Crawford, 20, carries groceries from a local market and also from a food pantry to her apartment in Riverside.<\/p>\n (Gina Ferazzi \/ Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n Up until Thursday, both Villavicencio and Crawford were preparing for hard times. The Mountain View mom was worried about telling her children about a diminished Thanksgiving this year. Crawford was calculating how to further improvise on using her food budget wisely. <\/p>\n Both women were relieved that, on the sixth day of the month, their benefits had fully reloaded. <\/p>\n \u201cI can breathe now,\u201d Villavicencio said Friday.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m super-shocked,\u201d added Crawford with a laugh. \u201cI feel relieved. I just feel happy.\u201d<\/p>\n This article is part of The Times\u2019 equity reporting initiative<\/a>, funded by the James Irvine Foundation<\/a>, exploring the challenges facing low-income workers and the efforts being made to address California\u2019s economic divide.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For Zuri Crawford, the last several weeks have been an emotional whirlwind \u2014 swinging from fears to frustration…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":44087,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[29258,29257,3302,7,29253,9,8,3409,29252,29259,23500,7036,3906,4265,29256,29254,430,29255],"class_list":{"0":"post-44086","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-california","8":"tag-20-year-old-single-mother","9":"tag-abigail-villavicencio","10":"tag-calfresh","11":"tag-california","12":"tag-california-family","13":"tag-california-headlines","14":"tag-california-news","15":"tag-child","16":"tag-crawford","17":"tag-early-friday","18":"tag-food-aid","19":"tag-last-year","20":"tag-month","21":"tag-school","22":"tag-single-parent","23":"tag-snap-food-benefit","24":"tag-week","25":"tag-young-son"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44086","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=44086"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44086\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44087"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44086"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44086"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44086"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}} <\/p>\n
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