Delaware and Maryland governors are jumping in to fill the gap left by the suspension of SNAP food assistance program this month as a result of the government shutdown. But other groups are also taking up the effort. Delmarva Public Media's Kevin Diaz visited one farmers market in St. Michaels that is helping out.
RUSH: Beginning this month, the food stamp program known as SNAP will not be providing assistance to its beneficiaries. It is a casualty of the government shutdown, even as governors in the state of Maryland and Delaware rush to fill the gap. One of the local farmers markets in St. Michael's is also trying to help out and Delmarva Public Media's Kevin Diaz checked in with them this past Saturday.
DIAZ: It's a crisp Fall day at the St. Michael's Farmer's Market. The music is flowing and so are the shoppers moving between the stalls, produce, eggs, meats, and plants. It's also November 1st, marking the first full month of the federal government shutdown, which has put federal food stamp benefits in doubt. That's left Rose Reagan wondering about her monthly food budget.
REAGAN: I think my date is the 14th, but what I was told is that starting November the first, there will be no more SNAP benefits, so I'm not expecting anything this month. I don't know what's going to happen.
DIAZ: Reagan sells pot plants and herbal teas that she grows at her home on Tilghman Island, but that doesn't put enough food on the table, so she has to rely on the Federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program or "SNAP" as the food stamp program is called. With the program now in legal limbo in the courts, she's already closely guarding her $125 monthly benefit.
REAGAN: I have cut back, I'm not building up a supply for the wintertime as I typically would be doing this time of year because there's just not enough money.
DIAZ: Amid the uncertainty for Reagan and another 680,000 or so SNAP recipients in Maryland, she feels a certain bewilderment.
REAGAN: I don't follow the news. It's too toxic. It makes me unhappy, so I'm not really sure what's going on, but my actual feeling is there's enough food in this country. Nobody should be going hungry.
DIAZ: Fortunately for Reagan, the state of Maryland has decided to step into the breach, adding to the spending power of recipients like her, and just as important, the St. Michael's Farmer's Market also has decided to chip in funds as one of the few farmer's markets on the Eastern shore that can process SNAP transactions.
BALDWIN: They can go to the same vendors, get the same food they need.
DIAZ: That's Holly Baldwin, the market manager in St. Michael's. She's also a single mother of two children who knows what it means to survive with food stamps.
BALDWIN: I am a county planner. I have a master's degree and I have a second job as the market manager and I have had to rely on SNAP during times when I've either not had this many jobs or my jobs just didn't pay enough. I was a substitute teacher at one point and I was working every day and was still getting SNAP benefits.
DIAZ: Shoppers who use SNAP benefit cards, they looked like credit cards, can redeem part of the benefits plus the matching grants at a market tent here where Baldwin works amid a pair of judicial rulings on Friday that could keep the federal benefits flowing. There's some relief on Saturday, but nobody's taking anything for granted.
WARD: I think people are worried beyond SNAP.
DIAZ: That's Tracy Ward, president of the St. Michael's Farmer's Market.
WARD: It's not a good thing if your government is shut down. It's not comfortable and people are being hurt and indirectly we're all being hurt, if not directly. So I think the mood is probably sombering.
DIAZ: It's not just the folks who rely on SNAP Cards who are worried, the vendors have a stake in the program as well. Here's Bret Coulbourne of the Triangle Farms.
COULBOURNE: The whole deal is a downhill spiral from soup to nuts. I mean, the people can't get the food they can't eat, and then on the back end of it, we're not getting paid either.
DIAZ: With the SNAP program still up in the air for at least a little while longer, this Farmer's market says it stands ready to fill the breach as long as it can, however long that may be. In St. Michael's, this is Kevin Diaz reporting.
