In Kentucky Some Fear, Some Cheer Proposed Food Stamp Cuts

September 24, 2013

Depending on one’s political perspective, the $40 billion cut to the U.S. food stamp assistance program - recently passed by the Republican-controlled House of Representatives and now under consideration by the Democrat-led Senate - is either a measure to curb a growing culture of dependency or is cold indifference to those most in need. The debate over food stamps continues in Kentucky, a southern state with one of the highest poverty rates in the United States.

The Shively Area Ministries near Louisville, Kentucky, operates a food distribution program in an area where the poverty rate has risen from 11 to 18 percent in the last decade. Marvin Pogue, a disabled veteran, depends on this private charity to supplement the $34 a month in food stamps he receives. Cutting his assistance further, he says, would be punitive.

“That’s crazy. I mean we’re not getting enough now to get by through the month," he said. "That is why we are having to go to outside facilities.”

Coordinator Sister Jean Anne Zappa says the program feeds 20,000 families a year. The ministry was able to increase private contributions after the U.S. Department of Agriculture cut its donations to food banks almost in half last year. She says it will not be able to fill the gap if the proposed cuts to the food stamp program go through.