At the start of every month, when SNAP benefits are typically issued, staff and volunteers at Matthew’s Hope in Cocoa usually don’t see as many people in need of food.
Between their prepared meals, food pantry, outreach meal bags and mobile meals, they serve an average of 1,175 people a week.
But this week, as the federal government shutdown drags on and the status of food benefit funding remains in limbo, the demands of the community served by the nonprofit homeless outreach organization have reached an untenable high.
Volunteers and staff sort and package donated food on Nov. 4 at Second Harvest Food Bank of Central Florida’s Melbourne location, 3125 Skyway Circle. With multiple locations, this nonprofit provides more than 300,000 meals daily.
“It’s bad, it’s rough, it’s sad,” said Scott Billue, founder, president and CEO of Matthew’s Hope Ministries.
“My staff is struggling with what they’re seeing, and they do this every day, but not at this level to where people have tears in their eyes and say, ‘Look, if I get hungry, can I come back? Can I get a second helping?’
The same scenario is playing out at food pantries and centers serving the hungry across the Space Coast and Florida: Unprecedented, in some cases, numbers of people showing up for food assistance, lining up before pantries open for the day.
Because of the federal government shutdown, SNAP benefits for November were put on hold, with the U.S. Department of Agriculture posting on its website that the “well has run dry.” Despite rulings by judges in Massachusetts and Rhode Island ordering the department to use contingency funds to cover benefits, the message remains online, and it’s not clear when SNAP recipients will receive their benefits.
On Nov. 3, the Trump administration said in a court filing that it would use a reserve to cover “50% of eligible households’ current allotments.” While Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said payments could begin as soon as Nov. 5 during an interview on CNN’s “State of the Union” on Nov. 2, organizations providing food assistance in Brevard are bracing for the possibility that SNAP recipients may go without their benefits for much longer.
In Brevard, a little more than 10% of the county’s households were receiving SNAP or cash assistance in 2023, the latest year data was available, according to the Florida Department of Health.
Even when — and if — the funding starts to come in, it won’t be enough to handle the enormity of the need in Brevard, said Derrick Chubbs, president and CEO of Second Harvest Food Bank of Central Florida. Along with Brevard, the food bank serves Lake, Marion, Orange, Osceola, Seminole and Volusia counties, collecting, storing and distributing food to a network of more than 870 feeding partners like food pantries, senior centers, mobile distributions and soup kitchens.
“While I’m appreciative of the partial funding, it’s still going to fall well short of what we know is going to be needed on a daily basis,” Chubbs said.
“On a weekly basis, we get around 3,000 inquiries from people searching for food. Last week, that number was 10,000.”
Through their partner agencies, Second Harvest produces about 300,00 meals per day, Chubbs said.
To put that in perspective: “For every one (meal) we do, SNAP does nine,” he said.
And for those receiving that boost to their budget, the consequences of the delay can be devastating, Chubbs said.
“The food benefits aren’t coming, but they still have to pay the rent. They still have to pay utilities. They still have to buy gas. And pay for childcare. So there are multiple dynamics going on,” he said.
“However or whatever they’re leveraging to make ends meet, it’s going to take them months to get to a level of sustainability … so this doesn’t just end with funding. I fully expect these numbers to be about this high for the foreseeable future, and that’s not an exaggeration.”
Community’s needs continuing to grow
It’s been a rough year at Matthew’s Hope. They’re used to serving the most disadvantaged in Brevard and at their Winter Garden campus, helping those on the brink of homelessness and individuals who live in their cars or on the streets, but recently, it’s been harder than ever.
“For the last … two months, we’ve really exploded in the number of baby boomers needing help that are newly homeless,” he said. “They really don’t know how to be homeless, along with young families … just because they can’t qualify (for assistance).”
Essentially, the needs of Brevard residents were growing substantially even before SNAP was cut off, said Billue, and numbers aren’t going down at any of the agencies offering food assistance on the Space Coast.
A few of those numbers:
Second Harvest: 729,166 meals distributed per month in Brevard.
Sharing Center of Central Brevard: Kitchen serves an average of 140 meals a day, or 3,920 meals a month. Through the food pantry, the center serves about 26 households a day; 73% of those served are households and 27% are single individuals.
The Children’s Hunger Project: Serves 4,800 children per week; estimates they reach thousands of families weekly.
At Matthew’s Hope, as more seek help, the organization is asking for donations of items people can open and eat on the go — single-serve, pop-top items like protein drinks, individually packaged SPAM, granola bars and other items.
It’s important, Billue said, for the items to be lightweight enough to be carried in a bag.
Volunteers and staff sort and package donated food at the Melbourne location of Second Harvest Food Bank of Central Florida. With multiple locations, this nonprofit provides over 300,000 meals a day.
“You know, in Florida, being it’s now illegal to sleep outside, we also want to keep things small, because they’re dragging it around,” he said. “They’re living out of a backpack and hoping not to get arrested.”
People who’ve never needed assistance are seeking it
As both jobs and income are halted or lost to the shutdown, longstanding debate, both in the political arena and the general public, rages about who “deserves” help and who doesn’t, and how much that help should be.
“There’s this conception that if someone’s hungry, they’re lazy, or if they’re on SNAP, they don’t want to work,” Chubbs said.
“Nothing could be further from the truth. Around 60 percent of the people who are utilizing the charitable food system are working households, some of them working multiple jobs. Things are piling on right now … over probably a year now, we’ve been dealing with an economic crisis. And by that, I mean just the cost of living … in terms of housing costs, food, daycare, I don’t know anything that’s literally gone down.”
On top of that, Chubbs said, food agencies are seeing people seeking assistance for the first time. Federal employees who say they “never thought I’d have to get in line and ask for food.” Seniors on fixed incomes who were already struggling because of price increases are “having to pitch in to take care of their grandchildren,” Chubbs said, and seeking food aid they may never have dreamed they’d need.
The drain on resources is a constant concern, and with holidays coming up, demand will, as it always does, increase, Chubbs said.
“One of the good things about Central Florida is the community steps up,” he said.
“However, a nine to one ratio is hard to make up, and even if we’re getting close to it, it’s not sustainable. We’re still going to need the help of the community, whether it’s volunteering, building boxes, whatever people can do, and we still need financial support. We will remain focused on working with our partner agency network to fill the food gap that has already been created.”
At Matthew’s Hope, Billue said his plan is to keep helping people as long as he can.
But because SNAP benefits typically covered about 85% of people’s needs, with the food pantry at Matthew’s Hope supplementing the other 15%, it won’t be doable long-term if the halt of SNAP benefits continues, he said.
“I don’t know how we absorb 100% of their food needs,” Billue said. “But I also don’t know where else they can go. So we’ve kind of taken on the attitude of we’re going to help until we can’t.”
For information on donations to food-centered agencies: Contact Second Harvest Food Bank of Central Florida, Matthew’s Hope, the Children’s Hunger Project, Brevard Schools Foundation, Space Coast Brigade of Hope, North Brevard Charities Sharing Center, Sharing Center of Central Brevard or South Brevard Sharing Center.
You can also find local food pantries through 211 Brevard by texting your ZIP code to 898211, or by visiting their website and looking under their “Resource Database.” Select “I need help with food” on the dropdown menu to find a map of Space Coast pantries.
Britt Kennerly is education/breaking news/Style editor at FLORIDA TODAY. Contact Kennerly at 321-917-4744 or bkennerly@floridatoday.com. Twitter: @bybrittkennerly Facebook: /bybrittkennerly
Finch Walker is the education reporter at FLORIDA TODAY. Contact Walker at fwalker@floridatoday.com. X: @_finchwalker. Instagram: @finchwalker_.
This article originally appeared on Florida Today: Brevard agencies face surge of families in need as SNAP limbo drags on
