Farm Share urging federal government to provide additional funding to help feed millions in state
MIAMI – Farm Share is urging the federal government to provide them with additional funding to help feed millions of people in the state of Florida.
South Florida has one of the greatest needs for extra supplies. At Farm Shares headquarters in Homestead, the lack of food is noticeable. Normally, pallets filled with food are stacked to the ceiling and there is no empty space. Right now, that's a different story.
"Farm Share is doing about 7.5 million meals going out the door on a monthly basis," says Farm Share CEO Stephen Shelley.
Despite the shortage, Farm Share is doing what they can to help people in South Florida. On Wednesday, more than 550 families waited in line to get food.
"You can't buy anything now, everything is too expensive," says one man.
"Electricity, the water, everything is so high. You don't have any money once you retire," says Elsa Sanchez of southwest Miami-Dade.
Within the last year, federal funding to help supply food was cut back significantly, to pre-pandemic levels, even though there are more than double the amount of people facing food-insecurity.
At 89 years old, Elsa Sanchez is one of them. She along with hundreds of people in line for food tell us they're unable to buy everything they need at the grocery store because food is too expensive.
Shelley says this will likely be a lingering problem. He's anticipating an increase in demand for at least the next 12-18 months. He's pushing for the Federal Government to up funding.
"They're the only entity that's able to provide the large quantities of food we need. We're talking 100-150 semi-truck loads monthly of a gap that we need to fill."
Until then, he says, "Farm Share will continue to do all that we can do to develop additional food sources and additional sources of food. We'll feed as many people as we can with the food available to do so."