How Lexington County churches are responding to food shortages in SNAP shutdown
With local residents struggling with the federal government’s halting of food support during the budget shutdown this month, churches in Lexington County are stepping in to try to fill the gaps.
Mission Lexington, the nonprofit backed by several local churches to serve the county’s neediest residents, has seen a surge in demand at its regional food bank since the Trump administration ordered cutbacks in Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program funds during the ongoing government shutdown, now the longest in American history.
“We’re seeing 25 new families a day as of last week,” said Mission Lexington CEO Amy Reeves, on top of the 2,000 families the group’s food bank on Harmon Street regularly serves.
But she said increased support from the community has allowed Mission Lexington to make an extraordinary commitment: anyone who comes in with a SNAP card will receive a three-month pledge of support through the end of January, Reeves said.
“When we sat internally and met as a team, we wanted to make sure they could get through the holidays,” the CEO said.
That generosity has been made possible by “an enormous amount of support from folks who have stepped up,” she said, from the mission’s relationships with local grocery stores to supporters who have put donation containers out on their front porches.
“Churches are not set up to meet the demand. They don’t have someone on site all the time,” Reeves said. “We’ve just been blessed to be able to do holiday meals, so that we know everybody has a Thanksgiving meal.”
Lexington Baptist Church is one of the area churches that are supporting Mission Lexington. They are collecting food donations ahead of a church Thanksgiving dinner planned for Nov. 19, said church communication director Maegan Bolding.
“They have specifically requested proteins, meats and beans, canned fruits and vegetables, so we’ve asked people to bring those,” Bolding said. The church is also being proactive in reaching out to families they know might be struggling.
The Brookland-Lakeview Empowerment Center, the nonprofit arm of West Columbia’s Brookland Baptist Church, has seen requests at its food pantry double in the last few weeks, said Executive Director Cindye Richburg Cotton.
“We saw the same people coming in prior to this, but now we have a lot of new people coming in too,” Richburg Cotton said.
The center can “barely keep food stocked in our pantries” and has yet to receive funding from the multi-million-dollar One SC Fund activated by Gov. Henry McMaster at the end of October, the director said. She asks that donations be made at the center’s main location at 1218 Batchelor Street, or Brookland’s Northeast Columbia campus at 1203 Summit Parkway.
The church’s Brookland Foundation operates its own food bank on the second and fourth Mondays of the month in concert with Harvest Hope on Batchelor Street, as well as a free farmers market giving away fresh produce from 4 to 7 p.m. Tuesday at the northeast site.
Other churches are finding other ways they can help. Lexington United Methodist has a 3-by-4-foot “blessing box” church members keep stocked with food accessible from the street by anyone who needs it. Pastor Mack McDowell ties to the box to the Lexington County Courthouse across East Main Street from his church.
“Every day I see people leaving the parking lot and their life has been crushed,” McDowell said. “Either the family breadwinner is going to jail or they have been hit with a fine they can’t pay, and then they see the blessing box. There are hands in there every 15 to 20 minutes.”
The church also fills a “snack sack” each week for more than 900 students at 14 elementary and middle schools across the county so that hungry children can make it through the weekend without the meals they receive at school. Church member Rick Cunningham collects donations to provide the snack sacks, and said they always need additional donations each week.
“Two years ago, we served 550 kids, and that has a lot to do with the growth in Lexington,” Cunningham said. “Another school just called me, and I had postponed them out of money concerns.”
The program collects donations from local businesses and other United Methodist churches around the area, but “With the changes going on with some of the churches and with churches splitting up, some are getting out of the program,” Cunningham said.
Reeves said that even with the additional food support, the loss of SNAP has had ripple effects on other areas of people’s lives.
“As the weather is turning, people are having trouble keeping the lights on,” she said. “Utility bills are running higher this year. Just trying to keep them in their homes, that’s where the crunch is.”
That’s why Reeves is so thankful for the outpouring of support from the community. “Even if you think, ‘my three cans of green beans aren’t enough’ — it is,” she said.
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