A line of people filed past cucumbers, red delicious apples and a box of green peppers so big you could jump inside it and walked away with their arms, bags and carts full of food Saturday at San Diego County’s Live Well Center in Chula Vista.
The event was the first in a series of county food distributions meant to help fill the gap left by cuts to federal food aid programs. County officials said they gave food to 220 people.
San Diego County officials estimated the cuts from President Donald Trump’s signature spending bill, known as H.R.1, would affect 93,500 San Diegans. In June, the San Diego County Board of Supervisors approved $1 million in county funds for food distribution as part of the Safety Net Bridge initiative created by District 4 Supervisor Monica Montgomery Steppe.
The event, held in partnership with the Jacobs & Cushman San Diego Food Bank, is the first in over 90 the county has planned throughout the next year to support an estimated 9,600 households in need. In addition to the produce, boxes containing tuna, chicken, beef stew, spaghetti, rice and milk were also provided.
“We’ll be in Spring Valley. We’ll be in Oceanside. We’ll be in El Cajon,” Steppe said. “It was important for us to use county facilities. We want to have more skin in the game as a county.”
H.R.1 made some immigrants such as asylum seekers, human trafficking victims and refugees ineligible for benefits as of April and gave other people three months starting in June to meet new work requirements.
San Diego Food Bank CEO Casey Castillo said he’s seen demand rise as a result.
“Historically when there is a pullback in government benefits, it drives people to food pantries,” he said.
Nearly 30,000 San Diego County residents have already dropped off CalFresh, California’s food assistance program, in the 10 months since Trump signed H.R. 1. More than 25,000 of them left before the law’s changes took effect, an inewsource analysis of enrollment data found.
Alberto Banuelos, the county’s director of self-sufficiency services, said the drop is partially due to legitimate fears that receiving CalFresh could jeopardize recipients’ immigration status, as it did during the first Trump administration, and the mistaken notion that Calfresh data could be accessed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
“We don’t share our data,” he said.
The county is working to make sure as many people stay on the program as possible. Saturday’s event had a tent where county enrollment workers were available to help people sign up for CalFresh benefits. They also launched what they’re calling the WorkReady Hub to help people connect to opportunities to fulfill the new requirements.
This year’s county budget included funding for 144 new enrollment workers to help people access benefits, and they are in various stages of being hired.
Banuelos said he sees partnerships like the Chula Vista food distribution as key to meeting the moment.
“Before we were kind of siloed,” he said.
County officials are addressing reductions in CalFresh enrollment now, but larger cuts are on the horizon.
Starting in October, additional changes will go into effect for Medi-Cal, the state’s version of the federal public health insurance program for low-income individuals called Medicaid.
The county estimates that will cause over 300,000 residents to have to find work or volunteer opportunities and that 68,000 of these people will lose benefits.
The San Diego County Board of Supervisors will consider a plan to implement the medical side of the Safety Net Bridge program in the fall.
“It’s certainly still impacting our community in a major way,” Steppe said. “You know, people are hungry. And at the beginning of next year, they’re going to experience ineligibility around Medicaid. We understand that. But we are working hard to mitigate that.”
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News: Based on facts, either observed and verified directly by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources.
