Nonprofit says it will have sharp cutbacks on food assistance

Local nonprofit Family & Intercultural Resource Center is sounding the alarm that if they do not get more funding soon they will have to start cutting back on services and turning people away.

After reporting a $300,00 budget deficit in 2023, the nonprofit launched a fundraising campaign to raise $600,000 for the next two years. Over the past couple weeks, it has approached county and town governments notifying them of what’s at stake if the funding doesn’t come through and asking for financial assistance.

“We are going to have to go back to the drawing board and decide how we’re going to give out less food, essentially,” executive director Brianne Snow said, regarding the consequences of not getting the funding.

She said this could take away the option for families to come get food weekly — limiting people to visiting twice, maybe even once, a month — or cutting back on the amount of food they give.

Snow said she is really hoping not to have to do that, noting that at the beginning of the winter the nonprofit had “people coming in and saying that they were completely dependent upon the food market in order to eat and feed their family.”

Over the last two years, the nonprofit has been serving a record number of people. The Family & Intercultural Resource Center saw a 60% increase in the amount of people it served in its food pantries from 2022 to 2023. Overall it serves an estimated 40% of Summit County’s entire population in some capacity.

Snow said there are two issues in Summit County that are the root cause of many people’s financial instability and the correlation between the two only worsens things. These issues are the cost of housing and cost of food. Their correlation lies in the fact that people in tight financial situations cannot afford both.

Snow said that for almost everyone her nonprofit serves, housing has to take priority over food. This is leaving many families and individuals without adequate food, which is leading them to seek services from Family & Intercultural Resource Center.

In addition to food assistance, the nonprofit also helps people with health expenses and housing finances. Family & Intercultural Resource Center has data that indicates 15% of all Summit County adults are worried they might not have stable housing in the next two months. This is double the statewide average.

Data also demonstrated that while people may have been able to afford housing here five years ago, that has changed. There has been a 64% increase in costs of rent for an average two-bedroom apartment in the county over the last five years, the center said.