{"id":70944,"date":"2025-12-01T00:08:09","date_gmt":"2025-12-01T00:08:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/70944\/"},"modified":"2025-12-01T00:08:09","modified_gmt":"2025-12-01T00:08:09","slug":"el-paso-has-double-the-rate-of-food-insecurity-of-rest-of-texas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/70944\/","title":{"rendered":"El Paso has double the rate of food insecurity of rest of Texas"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">EL PASO, Texas (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.ktsm.com\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:KTSM;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">KTSM<\/a>) \u2014 Texas has the highest rate of food insecurity in the nation and El Paso has twice the food insecurity of Texas.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">That\u2019s according to a presentation on hunger in the local area that the El Paso City Council will hear on Monday, Dec. 1 during its regularly scheduled work session.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">\u201cFood insecurity is an official term from the USDA (U.S. Department of Agriculture). It\u2019s when people don\u2019t have enough to eat and don\u2019t know where their next meal will come from,\u201d according to backup material in the council agenda packet.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">The council will hear a presentation from Warren Goodell, the executive director for the Kelly Center for Hunger Relief.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">The work session is scheduled for 9 a.m. on Monday at the council chambers at City Hall, 300 N. Campbell.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">According to the presentation, the United States has a 12.8 percent rate of food insecurity, Texas is at 17.6 percent and El Paso sits at 35 percent.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">People who experience food insecurity are \u201cmore likely to experience malnutrition and chronic conditions like heart disease and diabetes,\u201d the presentation states.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">There is also a \u201cstrong and mutual correlation\u201d between food insecurity and mental health issues like depression, anxiety, anger and stress, the presentation states.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">\u201cNot meeting basic needs like food and shelter can lead to social isolation, stigma and shame,\u201d the presentation adds.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Without food, people who experience food insecurity may have difficulty concentrating, have low energy or miss school or work due to illness, according to the presentation.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">According to the presentation, food insecurity costs the local area $745.9 million a year in total costs due to illness, missing school and impact on charities.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">The per-capita impact of food insecurity comes out to $857.47.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">The Kelly Center\u2019s mission is to help El Pasoans address hunger and food insecurity through its food pantry and other programs.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">You can learn more about the Kelly Center for Hunger Relief by <a href=\"https:\/\/kellyfresh.org\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:clicking here;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">clicking here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ktsm.com\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to KTSM 9 News.;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \"> For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to KTSM 9 News. <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"EL PASO, Texas (KTSM) \u2014 Texas has the highest rate of food insecurity in the nation and El&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":70945,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[138,140,139,6246,5876],"class_list":["post-70944","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-el-paso","tag-el-paso","tag-el-paso-headlines","tag-el-paso-news","tag-food-insecurity","tag-usda"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70944","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70944"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70944\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/70945"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70944"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70944"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70944"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}