Indiana has ended its participation in the federally enhanced Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), so going forward, many food-insecure families will have less money for groceries.

For two years, all SNAP recipients received additional benefits to make ends meet.

Emily Weikert Bryant, executive director of Feeding Indiana's Hungry, explained the benefits will once again be based on several factors, such as income and household size. She said recipients can determine their exact benefit amount by calling the 800-number on the back of their electronic benefits card.

"And it will give you the last benefit you received in May, and it will also give you the benefit amount for June," Weikert Bryant noted. "Families can at least prepare a little bit for the amount that they'll start seeing when benefits start loading on the fifth."

Those who need additional food aid can call 211, which will connect them with food aid organizations across the state. Families who rely on free and reduced-cost school meals for kids can also call or text the U.S. Department of Agriculture's national hunger hotlines to find a local summer meal site. The service offers support in both English and Spanish.

Weikert Bryant pointed out the end of enhanced aid is coming at a tough time for food-insecure families, as inflation for everyday goods remains high. The U.S. Department of Agriculture reports the cost of groceries rose nearly 11% from April 2021 to April 2022.

"It's also impacting the food bank network as well," Weikert Bryant emphasized. "Our transportation costs have gone up 20% in the last year. We're paying 40% more for food purchases to keep up with the demand and make up for the fewer food donations that we're seeing."

Weikert Bryant added ending the enhanced food aid will mean a loss of more than $50 million a month of additional SNAP benefits being spent with Indiana grocers and food sellers. At least 17 other states ended federally enhanced SNAP benefits in May.

Preliminary data shows schools are serving fewer meals than they did last year, largely due to the end of nationwide pandemic-era waivers which allowed schools to serve meals at no cost to all children. According to a recent report, Kentucky saw a 34% increase in lunch participation and a nearly 3% increase in the number of kids who ate breakfast at school over the past few years.

Clarissa Hayes, Deputy Director for School and Out-of-School Time Programs at the Food Research & Action Center, said the gap between Kentucky kids receiving breakfast and lunch now appears to be widening as kids and families go back to the tiered eligibility system used to determine who qualifies for free school meals.

"For Kentucky, what we saw is that for the breakfast-to-lunch comparison, for every 100 children receiving a lunch, about 65 are receiving a breakfast," Hayes said. "So, that's a little bit lower than the year before where, for every 100 children receiving lunch, 85 are receiving a breakfast."

Research shows regular school meals improve kids' academic performance, mental health and nutritional intake. Federal data from 2019 shows nearly 15-million students ate a school breakfast and nearly 30-million students ate school lunch on a typical day.

There are pathways to ensuring that consistent access to healthy school meals is a reality for all kids, Hayes said.

"Ideally, that would be expanded, expanded on the federal level, but we are seeing many states that are taking it upon themselves to pass legislation to make sure that all kids are getting those meals at no cost," she said.

Some states are stepping up to fill the gap to cover the cost of school meals regardless of kids' eligibility, including California, Maine and Colorado.


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Red tape and other hurdles are getting in the way, especially for those children who aren't getting nutritious meals at home, the people in charge of keeping kids fed in Kentucky schools said.

Leah Feagin, Nutrition Director at Mayfield Independent Schools, said administrative burdens and differing guidelines for federal programs have left her with mounds of paperwork, including having to provide attendance rosters in order to feed kids after-school snacks and supper, which she says is time-consuming.

"Why are we having to jump through all these hoops when, if I'm doing this for breakfast and lunch, I'm obviously going to do this for snack and supper? I'm not going to do it a different way," Feagin said.

Groups fighting childhood hunger are rallying today at the State Capitol in Frankfort for state policies that would give schools more flexibility to offer meals to kids, boost safety-net programs like SNAP and WIC, and expand the state's Farms to Food Banks program.

Cassidy Wheeler, advocacy coordinator at Feeding Kentucky, pointed out because pandemic-era "free meals for all kids" policies have ended, not all students qualify for school meals, leaving the school districts with lower reimbursement rates.

"Their budgets are really suffering, you know," Wheeler said. "They're having a really hard time being able to serve nutritious meals that meet all of the USDA standards, because they just don't have the money for it."

Feagin said many children come to school in the morning on an empty stomach, go without lunch, and added those kids will remain hungry, unless they eat at school.

"My problem is those parents that aren't sending food for their kids. So, if I quit offering the program, I know those kids are being missed - and that's hard to contend with," Feagin said.

Nationwide, almost 1.5-million children regularly received an after-school supper through Afterschool Nutrition Programs, according to 2020 data from the Food Research and Action Center.

Students in the Orlando area could soon get more classroom time during their lunchtime, to learn more about ways to fight hunger and food waste.

It is estimated 40% of the food produced globally is lost or wasted. The "Food Waste Warrior" program of the World Wildlife Fund inspires children to help alleviate local and global food insecurity. It prompts them to think through practical, easy-to-implement solutions, like a "share table," where food they are not going to eat can be shared with someone else.

Alex Nichols-Vinueza, program manager for food loss and waste for the World Wildlife Fund, said the idea is to empower students to have a role in addressing issues in their community.

"Around food insecurity, around the environmental impacts of the food system," Nichols-Vinueza explained. "It's a way that it's not controversial; that you can really engage students on some of these issues."

He pointed out they are just starting in Orlando, making connections with school districts and community partners and their goal is to work with five to seven schools in the year ahead. In addition to providing free educational materials, there will be grant opportunities to get programs and ideas off the ground.

Nichols-Vinueza noted reducing food waste is increasingly being recognized as an effective solution to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. He added it is not political, like so many facets of the climate-change debate. And one practical way to help students understand is through "show and tell."

"Engaging in an interactive way, get into their cafeterias and look at what's being thrown away," Nichols-Vinueza emphasized. "What are those foods that are most being discarded, and why. And it's a very visceral understanding of the issue."

The program calls on schools across the country to use their cafeterias as classrooms through activities like conducting food-waste audits, and learning more about the connections between their food, wildlife and habitat conservation.