Centre County and other counties throughout Pennsylvania have seen an overall decline in state funding for food pantries in recent years. Now they’re joining together with human services agencies in an effort they hope will reverse that trend.
The county plans to send a letter to Gov. Tom Wolf asking for an increase in the overall allocation to Pennsylvania’s State Food Purchase Program. The initiative is part of a campaign being led by the Central PA Food Bank, which works with more than 1,000 partner agencies and programs in a 27-county area.
‘This came down from Commissioner [Michael] Pipe who had a nice connection to the Central PA Food Bank and they’re working on a campaign to let the state know how much… additional money we could use for the SFPP to really fulfill the need based on inflation,’ Faith Ryan, Centre County director of Adult Services, said at Tuesday’s Board of Commissioners meeting.
For fiscal year 2018-19, Centre County’s eight in-network food pantries — those that receive state and federal funds — served 3,399 low-income individuals, Ryan said. Since 2017-18, the county has seen a decrease of $5,272 in SFPP funds. Last year, Centre County received $92,962 from SFPP.
‘Of course we’re very fortunate to have a lot of other outlying food pantries amongst various communities and churches as well. So we’re only talking about the ones that receive funding through our office,’ Ryan said.
The county’s eight in-network food banks and pantries are Faith Centre Food Bank in Bellefonte; Howard Area Food Pantry in Beech Creek; Penns Valley Family Service Center in Aaronsburg; Centre Hall-Potter Township Area Food Pantry; Philipsburg Community Action Food Pantry; Snow Shoe/Mountaintop Food Pantry; State College Food Bank; and Centre House homeless shelter in State College.
Statewide, SFPP funding has decreased from $18.7 million in 2006-07 to $18.188 million in 2018-19. Ryan said the campaign is recommending $36 million in statewide funding, which she said ‘would be quite an achievement,’ but that any increase would help.
Ryan said that at one time funding was allotted on separate line items for food and equipment but those had since merged. An increase in funding, she said, could help with not only food purchases but also equipment like freezers and shelving.
The commissioners voted to move the letter to Wolf to next week’s consent agenda for approval.
‘This is something that [Central PA Food Bank] is asking all counties and all other human service folks that are partnering with the food banks to really get behind. So I think it was important for us to consider this,’ Pipe said. ‘We’ve got a lot of great groups and organizations and volunteers that help these food pantries run and so I think it was just a way that we could show our support for the work they do and for our citizens who in that time of need could be really helped by having the availability of the food pantry.’
Ryan added that for local donations and drives, the pantries are often in need of items that cannot be purchased with state and federal money, such as toiletries and paper products, and items that families go through fast such as juice and cereal. Anyone interested in a donation drive can contact the Office of Adult Services at 814-355-6768 for information on what is needed in different areas.
More information about food pantry locations, distribution days and needs is available on the Office of Adult Services website.
