Food Pantries Across the Country Lament Federal Cutbacks, But Was The Money Well Spent?
Food banks across the country are sounding alarms throughout social media and radio stations as Federal cutbacks have impacted the supply of needed food items. However, as many recognize the need for keeping these services afloat, questions loom on how well nonprofits manage federal funds and if the cuts may be justified.
Food banks across the county, including Second Harvest Foodbank of Clark, Champaign & Logan Counties were notified recently of a cancellation of some $500 million in subsidies nationally. Within Clark County, Second Harvest Food bank was informed that their expected $200,000 in needed food items typically provided by the Commodity Credit Corporation (CCC) program, which was scheduled for delivery between May and August of this year, had been cancelled.
The CCC, managed by the US Department of Agriculture, exists as a means of tracking and distributing federal subsidies throughout the foodbank system. According to a recent statement from the USDA, the cutbacks came as a direct result of slicing the Biden Administration’s bloated budgets which ballooned funding of such agencies to ‘unsustainable levels.’
Nationally, the CCC distributes these subsidies primarily to the conglomerate known as ‘Feeding America’, a national network of food pantries and banks throughout the county, of which Second Harvest is a member. It is through this network affiliation that most Second Harvest locations are connected as unified entities.
Within that network is the similarly affiliated Second Harvest Food bank of New Orleans, which has recently been caught embroiled in a scandal due to allegedly terminating multiple members of its board for refusing to use funds provided to them through the CCC to cover costs associated with sexual assault victim claims from the Catholic Diocese. According to The Guardian, the apostolate of the Catholic Diocese of New Orleans, was asked to contribute as much as $16 million to the cause of sexual abuse related bankruptcy and when several board members attempted to refuse, they were ousted.
As a 501c3 nonprofit, legal framework prohibits organizations from utilizing funds for any purpose not related to their stated goals, however as non profits across the country lament the loss of federal dollars, many are starting to ask if these nonprofit organizations are actually managing their funding accordingly. As gut wrenching as it may seem to have to make fiscal cuts to expenditures that cannot be sustained, it may be even worse if that money were misappropriated to covering organizational bankruptcy due to sex abuse scandals.
