By Aaron Dorman
Decisions about budget cuts or freezes made in Washington continue to reverberate and impact Northwest Indiana, food assistance and agriculture organizations say.
In particular, two recent decisions undercut local efforts to feed residents, they say: the ending of the Regional Food Business Center Program and the pausing of the Senior Community Service Employment program. The latter was a major benefit to senior staff at the Food Bank of Northwest Indiana, the organization said in a statement earlier this week.
“We have multiple staff members at the food bank who are in this job training program,” said Victor Garcia, the food bank’s president and CEO. “We are already finding ourselves in challenging situations given some of the constraints with new policy at the federal and state level. This is not the time to be taking even more resources from sister non-profits like the food bank and others in the community that benefit from this program that’s offered with federal dollars.”
The SCSEP funding helped organizations like the Food Bank of Northwest Indiana employ adults aged 55 and older with meaningful part-time opportunities.
According to food bank officials, the organization employed five individuals through the SCSEP program. While the organization was able to pull funds from other sources to pay three of those individuals, two part-time workers who helped in the warehouse will be leaving on Aug. 9, said Donna Miller, the food bank’s HR manager.
“I was happy and grateful that this was available and the SCSEP helped with job placement and readiness,” said Victoria Ford, one of the staff members who will stay on at least through the middle of next year, working the food bank front desk. “This role gives me purpose and has made my life more meaningful after retirement.”
Ford said she enjoyed interacting with other people and assisting personnel, and was “sorry to see” federal cuts, even if in this particular instance she’s able to continue.
Despite that, even with the Food Bank able to pull from other funding sources to keep some staff on, it was unclear what complications might arise, such as tax burdens, for staff formerly paid through the SCSEP, Miller said.
“I didn’t expect this pause,” said Tricia Sheaks, vice president of operations and community impact. “Paperwork is stacking up, and the face-to-face connection we value is harder to maintain.”
Sheaks did add that “we have no plans of slowing down” and that despite the challenges, the food bank remains resilient in its service to the community.
This is not the first time the Food Bank of Northwest Indiana has had to reposition funding sources this year; at their annual soiree, Garcia noted that the organization was asking for private donations to counteract the losses in federal financial support, and that as of midsummer, the food bank was able to counteract the shortfall.
Meanwhile, the USDA announced the termination of the $400 million Regional Food Business Center on July 15; locally, that means the end of the Great Lakes Midwest branch of that program, which offered “coordination, technical assistance, and capacity building opportunities through financial assistance to farmers, producers, and other food business owners,” costing individual farmers thousands in possible funding, according to the Michigan State University Center for Regional Food Systems.
Among the local organizations whose members will be affected are the NWI Food Council, one of the partners coordinating CRFS efforts initially through 2028.
“I believe that the opportunity lost for our food systems is the biggest takeaway from this program’s termination,” said Colleen Matts, director for the GLM Regional Food Business Center. “Over $10 million of financial support and technical assistance was intended for farmers, producers and food businesses in the Great Lakes Midwest region alone.”
Local farmers have been hit hard thus far by USDA cuts, particularly as they relate to farm-to-school programs. Earlier this year, some Northwest Indiana farmers expressed alarm that farm-to-school funding cuts eliminated a key market, at least temporarily. In addition, families in Indiana lost a key summer food assistance option when the “SUN bucks” program was terminated.