The number is 25,000.

That is the number of people the Chattanooga Area Food Bank serves each week via food ministries such as Morton Memorial United Methodist Church (MMUMC). That is also the number of people in the Chattanooga area whose relative food security would be threatened in the event that proposed budget cuts to USDA (U.S. Department of Agriculture) programs are approved.

“What’s important in terms of these programs is that the SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) is actually the most successful program of pulling people out of poverty,” said Laura Kilpatrick, Director of Agency and Government Relations at the Chattanooga Area Food Bank. “We have around 330 partners in our service area, and on the Mountain, we have four agency partners. The Grundy County Food Bank served 234 families last month, and Morton typically serves more than 100 families each month.

In Franklin County alone, it was estimated that 13.3 percent of the population were suffering from food insecurity. In Marion and Grundy County, numbers were even higher at 14.6 percent and 17.8 percent.

Amanda Diamond, Reverend of Morton Memorial United Methodist Church, said the food ministry at the church has already seen small effects from the proposed USDA budget cuts.

“Our director was first approached by the Chattanooga Food Bank because they had additional resources to provide to our ministry. Our food is not tied in to USDA, but it has given us a bump,” she said. “For us, our food ministry is about providing healthy, sustainable food for the people. Recipients get about 75 pounds of food at one time, and we tell them to share with their neighbors.”

According to Diamond, where Morton’s food ministry had been getting frozen chicken, canned vegetables and bottled juices, they are now only getting juices from the Chattanooga Area Food Bank.

Kilpatrick said in the event that the proposed changes become legislation, food banks like the Chattanooga Area center would not be able to keep up.

“We wouldn’t be able to take on the load. Our agency partners have to raise money for their programs, so for us to be have to try to grow that quickly and ramp up to what the need would be, people would go hungry,” she said. “With our donor streams, we’re still trying to close the gap in our service area over the next 10 years. To do that in the current political environment, we have to ramp up our distribution to over 20 million pounds by 2025. We are at little over 16.2 million pounds this year, and adding significant cuts on top of that would be detrimental.”

John Noffsinger, who attends MMUMC, is working with community members and Rotarians to finalize plans for the third Hunger Walk, an event that raises money for food ministries on the Mountain. Proceeds from the Hunger Walk helped to fund the purchase of 103,740 pounds of food that was distributed by MMUMC during the past year.