Food pantry here, Tupper Lake community step up in SNAP crisis
by Dan McClelland
As the federal shut-down continues past Day 34 (Monday) and the prospects this week of millions of Americans who rely on federal food programs like SNAP starting to go hungry, Tupper Lake and its incredible community food pantry are stepping up in this crisis.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture planned to freeze payments to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) starting Monday because it said it could no longer keep funding it due to the federal shutdown. The program serves about 1 in 8 Americans and is a major piece of the nation's social safety net — and it costs about $8 billion per month nationally.
Monday was also the deadline the Trump administration faced
to tell two federal judges whether it will comply with court orders that it continue to fund SNAP, the nation's biggest food aid program, using contingency funds during the government shutdown. There was news yesterday that President Trump told the judges that a partial SNAP fund could start as early as today.
Pantry Director Lisa Kimpflen this week applauded the outpouring of support for the pantry in recent days: “Thank you to the people of Tupper Lake! With the threatened suspension of SNAP and other benefit programs, there has been a big surge in requests for food from our food pantry here in Tupper Lake. As you know, we have many folks here living on the edge - seniors, working poor, and so on. At the same time, food pantries here and across the nation are trying to do more with less funding.
“But today I want to talk about the goodness I've seen. Support has flooded into our pantry from the community - both businesses and individuals. Monetary and food donations, as well as offers of volunteer help. As always, when there is a real need, Tupper Lakers step up to help their neighbors. I am proud to be a part of this community, and want to tell all of you that we are standing ready to serve the needs of our community.”
“If anyone is in need of food, please call us at 518-359-3080.
Mrs. Kimpflen, who took over the directorship of the pantry over a year ago, explained Monday that for the past week or so the traffic at the facility in the former Holy Ghost Academy building on Marion Ave. has been robust. At the same time the offers of help from individuals and businesses here have been huge too.
She said the current crisis “builds on something we’ve seen in the past couple of months with the support for food banks and food pantries being withdrawn.”
“We’ve seen higher food costs in general for us, and while we’re still okay, we’ve had to pull back on some of the things we’re able to offer our clients. But it really hasn’t affected our level of service so far. We’re still giving out a good amount of food to people in our area!”
With the SNAP program due to stop November 1, she said Monday that “beginning about a week and one half ago, there has been a huge surge in the number of people coming to us for food!”
The volunteer director said that for weeks people have been hearing that federal food program cuts would likely come as a result of an extended government shut-down. Most people figured, however, the government closure would be short and that grim prospect wouldn’t happen.
“As the shut-down continued, the prospect of federal food assistance programs stopping became more and more real, the people who rely on them to feed themselves and their families grew frightened.”
Mrs. Kimpflen said on Thursday, October 23, her volunteers were “slammed” on that second distribution day of that week. More than three times the number of people who normally come to the pantry here for food showed up that day.
People were starting to stockpile for the eventuality that SNAP (previously know as “food stamps”) could in fact stop. The move was reminiscent of what many folks due in preparation for a natural disaster like hurricanes.
“People were thinking for weeks that this wouldn’t happen, and then all of a sudden realized it certainly could...and they wouldn’t get their SNAP help!”
That Thursday, she said, that in addition to many of the regular clients they see each month, they saw many new clients who came to set up accounts and get food.
That trend continued last Tuesday and last Thursday (the two days each week the pantry is open).
She said that over those three days of food distribution they filled over 50 food orders- almost three times the normal. “On a normal business day, we might fill 7 to 10 orders.”
“People are scared...they are calling us up and there are apologetic, but they are afraid!”
“That’s the biggest effect we are seeing right now!”
She said along with that fear came the “huge response from the community” to make sure there was plenty of food on the pantry’s shelves to make sure it weathered this government-caused storm. “The size of response from folks here who wanted to help just blew me away!”
“Since Thursday everyone has been calling, asking how they can help!”
“A number of the businesses in town have called or e-mailed, offering assistance and asking what they could do to help us!”
She said too teachers from the elementary and middle/high schools here called and wanted to know if some of the classes could do food drives for the food pantry.
One of the teachers at the high school wanted to bring in his students to help us at the pantry, plus do a food drive, she added.
“One of our local businesses showed up Thursday with a check for an enormous donation!”
She said that day they had people showing up all afternoon, bringing with them many food donations. “We had several people show just to volunteer to help us” fill the increase in orders.
“The outpouring of help has been incredible...just absolutely amazing! Tupper Lake has always stepped up to help us, but this time it was exceptional!”
Mrs. Kimpflen said this crisis has generated some wonderful stories here. “I had one young man come in Thursday for the first time, and he said to me, ‘I just need a little food...don’t give me a lot of it because I don’t want to take food from other people...I can get by with just a little!’”
“I told him there is no need for him to just take a few things and we had plenty to share with him.”
She said while she normally doesn’t permit clients to look at their shelves or in their banks of refrigerators and freezers in the next room, she did in his case to assure him there was plenty of food there.
“So that’s the other message I wanted to get out to people in need of food here: Please don’t hesitate to call us!”
“We are prepared to handle (the increased need). We are planning to start distributing more food in coming days. But we are cutting back a little on some of the options we currently have, as we’re just too busy right now.”
-And she said they can always use more help at the Tuesday and Thursday distributions each week, especially if the SNAP crisis continues.
“If things go back to normal, the number of clients will level off again.” Under the rules of the food pantry program people can get two orders each month of three days worth of food.
She said that supply rule will be “bumped up to five days of food,” in the twice a month distributions. That increase started yesterday.
Added to the bags each distribution to stretch the supplies will be more low-cost ideas like Macaroni and Cheese, and other “kid-friendly” products.
Mrs. Kimpflen speculated that orders filled could eventually grow to a week’s worth of food in the distributions, depending what happens in coming days and weeks.
Other bad news expected this week is that the popular WIC program could be out of money this week. “SNAP and WIC are enormous benefit programs.”
As these programs stop, more and more people will be coming to us for help, she explained.
She said one of difficulties of any WIC shut-down, with respect to the food pantry operation, is because it doesn’t often deal with the distribution of baby food, as WIC does.
She thought Family Matters may start getting more calls, with respect to any WIC shortages of items normally provided to mothers and children.
Mrs. Kimpflen said that in the past any donations of baby food and products have been given to the Family Matters chapter here.
The Tupper Lake Food Pantry is open Tuesday mornings from 9a.m. to noon and Thursdays 1p.m. to 4p.m.
“We want people here to continue to use the services of our pantry. If people haven’t come to us in the past they should reach out to us to help us help them.”
“If you can’t get through to us on the phone, stop by and see us” at our facility in the former Holy Ghost Academy Tuesday mornings or Thursday afternoon.”