SEYMOUR – With the federal government shutdown and unease over SNAP food benefits ongoing, more than a dozen volunteers joined forces Friday (Nov. 7) to unload 12,656 pounds of canned goods, chicken and fresh fruit to help Valley residents struggling to put food on their tables.
TEAM Inc., the Valley’s community action agency, usually does food drops once a month. But Friday’s event was one of two emergency drops planned because of the anticipated lack of funding for the federal “Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program,” or SNAP.
The emergency drops are being made possible thanks to a $15,000 donation from Griffin Health Services.
“Griffin responded to the crisis of the increasing number of people turning to TEAM and to food pantries to address the gap created by the SNAP crisis,” said David Morgan, TEAM’s CEO.
While a federal judge on Thursday (Nov. 6) ordered the Trump administration to fully fund the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) for November, local food pantries are seeing an influx of families without food.
Note: at 3:32 p.m. Friday, Gov. Ned Lamont’s office issued a press release saying SNAP food benefits will be covered by the state this month if the fed money doesn’t come through.
“Even with the court injunction, until people get their money on their EBT/SNAP cards, there’s still extreme stress,” Morgan said. “I just met with an elderly woman living with her son and they’re literally delaying their rent payment to fill the gap of their grocery bill because they didn’t have anything on their SNAP card going into November.”
The food drops are done through TEAM’s “Project MANNA” (Mobilizing Action for the Nutritional Needs for All).
TEAM orders food directly from wholesale distributor, Bozzuto’s, Inc., and gets the food at cost, saving 25 to 38 percent off grocery store shelf prices, Morgan said. Volunteers then unload a tractor-trailer at Contractor Nation in the Silvermine Industrial Park in Seymour and transport the food to various local pantries.
Ansonia resident Joe Pinto said he and his fellow employees from IMA, an insurance firm, were glad to lend a helping hand.
“In the Valley we come together, and we feed our neighbors – we do what we can,” Pinto said while loading boxes of canned green beans into a delivery van.
Michael Desjardins, Griffin Health employee, loaded cartons of fresh eggs onto a Salvation Army truck.
“With the SNAP crisis that is happening, Griffin made a conscious effort to up the deliveries to close the gap,” Desjardins said.
John Burton, a longtime volunteer for the Kathleen Samela Memorial Food Pantry, based in Ansonia, helped the volunteers load food into the back of his truck.
“This food will go right to our pantry, and we’ll have people coming today to pick it up,” Burton said.
Debbie Engstrom, a coordinator for the Blessing Pantry at Trinity Church in Seymour was also pleased to receive the additional food.
“We’re a 24/7 pantry out in the parking lot at Trinity. We fill the pantry twice a day and it’s always empty,” Engstrom said.
Morgan said there are approximately 5,000 households that rely on monthly SNAP benefits in the core Valley communities, with Ansonia and Derby making up the most at almost 2,900, followed by Shelton at 1,300; Seymour at about 700; Oxford at about 200 and Beacon Falls at about 200 households.
For more information, visit Project MANNA online.