Food shelves deal with rising costs

By Keith Whitcomb Jr.
RUTLAND HERALD
With food prices rising, organizations who help those in need are getting by for now, but some are worried about what the future holds should costs continue going up.

“The biggest pressure is demand,” said Sue Minter, executive director of Capstone Community Action. “Costs go up, people don’t have as much on their own shelves, so they come to us. In the last four months we’ve seen increases.”

Capstone roughly estimates prices are up 10 percent. It gets food for its food shelf by donation and by purchasing it from various sources, the Vermont Foodbank among them.

Capstone kicked off a 100-day fundraiser on Tuesday called Fuel Your Neighbors, an effort it’s been spearheading since 2016. Minter said people were more generous than ever in 2020, despite, or perhaps due to, the pandemic, but she doesn’t know what this year will hold.

The organization, which serves the central Vermont area, plans to meet the growing need for food by finding the funds to pay for it.

“That’s how we respond, we raise money,” she said.

Food being more expensive isn’t the only thing sending people to the food shelves, she said. Fuel prices have also risen sharply, meaning less money in people’s grocery budgets.

Tom Donahue, chief executive officer of BROC Community Action, which serves Rutland and Bennington counties, said that so far acquiring food for people hasn’t been an issue. BROC is fortunate to have generous donors — The annual Stuff-A-Bus event raised about $40,000 which was split with other food shelves — and relationships with local grocery stores who donate on a daily basis.

Where BROC is feeling the squeeze is on the demand side of things. More people are coming to its food shelf lately as costs increase. While 3SquaresVT benefits were increased 25 percent, that money isn’t buying as much as it might have before due to the higher prices.

“It’s a great program, and I fully support, it but it’s still subject to inflation, because now you’ve got the benefit amount that doesn’t go as far and to make up the difference they turn to the food shelf,” he said.

He believes BROC should be able to meet the demand for food in the foreseeable future. The food pantry recently acquired freezer space allowing it to store meat and fresh produce.

The price of turkey was up 14 percent this year, said John Sayles, chief executive officer of the Vermont Foodbank. Canned goods were up as well, likely due to the cost of materials, but transportation as well.

“The prices we’re paying at the Foodbank and what people are seeing at the grocery stores are up, I’d say, between 10 percent and 30 percent,” he said.

Between federal coronavirus relief money and donations the Foodbank has been able to hold the line. Sayles noted that a $9 million donation from MacKenzie Scott, a billionaire once married to Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, has helped quite a bit to this end.

“If we had to rely on our usual donor base this would be a real stretch, and I think if this continues on for the next couple of years, it’s going to be a pinch not only to our food shelf partners, but for food banks all across the country,” he said.

Tracy Yendell, executive director at Fair Haven Concerned, said some changes have been made at the food shelf her group runs. She joined the organization in April, she said, and at the time, because of the pandemic, people would tell staff members what they needed for food and would have it brought to them. In May, it switched to letting people come in and select what they wanted.

“It’s very hard for people to come to a food shelf, it’s very hard for them to ask for help, and so we stress dignity for our clients, we revamped our entire food shelf, we set it up like a grocery store so people would feel like they’re shopping as opposed to asking, and we just really stressed client dignity,” she said. “But unfortunately on Oct. 18, I had to start limiting visits. We used to tell people to come when they need it, now we’re down to four times a month.”

She’d noticed an uptick in people coming to the food shelf since additional unemployment benefits ended.

Some food items are simply hard to find, such as tuna.

“It’s because of the supply. I cannot keep food on the shelves. We get most of our food from the Vermont Foodbank and they are awesome, but they can only offer what they have,” she said.

keith.whitcomb @rutlandherald.com