Media Coverage

The Congressional Budget Office said the cuts, particularly to Medicaid and SNAP, would create a 2% decrease in household income nationwide in 2027 for the 10% of Americans in the lowest income brackets, going to 4% by 2033. Households in the highest income brackets, however, could see raises.

The loss of SNAP funding, along with Medicaid, would reduce access to services that “are vital for everyday Ohioans in every Congressional district,” according to Joree Novotny, executive director of the Ohio Association of Foodbanks.

Novotny said the current proposal would shift nearly $500 million in SNAP costs per year onto the state of Ohio.

“That’s about the same as all the state general revenue spent to operate the entire Ohio Department of Job and Family Services each year,” Novotny said.

The food banks and other anti-hunger advocates are already asking the state to support bipartisan legislation that would create supplemental benefits for SNAP participants in Ohio.

Cuts to federal Medicaid spending that have been suggested in a draft budget that now sits in the U.S. House of Representatives would require an approximately 29% increase in state Medicaid spending per resident, should states try to make up the difference.

Last month, the Ohio Medicaid Matters Coalition — including the Ohio Hospital Association, Ohio Association of Foodbanks, Ohio State Medical Association and Ohio School-Based Health Alliance — asked Gov. Mike DeWine to be active in defending the state’s Medicaid benefits. At the time, they said Medicaid is a “critical driving force in fostering thriving communities,” while supporting the preservation of coverage for as many Ohioans as possible, according to a report by The Columbus Dispatch.

Necessary reductions in spending are never easy. Certainly doing things the way they have always been done isn’t going to change anything.

Joree Novotny, executive director, Ohio Association of Foodbanks, warned the bill will shift $500 million in annual SNAP costs to Ohio alone. “Hunger is a harsh reality for 1.8 million Ohioans. This includes children, seniors, veterans, and working families. Ohio’s foodbanks are doing everything they can, distributing more than 230 million meals last year, but we can’t fill the gap if SNAP is fundamentally changed in such a drastic way. Similarly, cuts to Medicaid will result in more impossible tradeoffs for families choosing between food, medicine, and medical care.”

Ohio advocates said proposed federal cuts to SNAP could force the state to absorb hundreds of millions in costs, threatening food access for families, seniors, and veterans.

The House Agriculture Committee recently advanced a bill to cut more than $230 billion from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and shift costs to states.

Joree Novotny, executive director of the Ohio Association of Foodbanks, said Ohioans need to pay attention.

"What's included in the bill text that came out of the House Agriculture Committee would have devastating impacts for the first line of defense against hunger in our country, our primary nutrition safety net program, which is the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP," Novotny explained.

Supporters of the bill said it promotes efficiency and state flexibility. Critics argued it would shift nearly $1 billion in SNAP costs to Ohio over two years, equivalent to the state's entire Department of Job and Family Services general revenue fund.

Novotny warned without federal support, the burden on states would jeopardize other critical services and overwhelm food banks.

URBANA, OHIO — Oaks and Sprouts, Tonni and Graham Oberly’s family farm, got the email from the Ohio Association of Foodbanks just after five o’clock on the first Friday in March.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture, or USDA, had notified the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services that it was ending a program that gave state, tribal and territorial governments federal dollars to stock food pantries from farms within a 400-mile radius. The Ohio Association of Foodbanks, in turn, shared the notice with the more than 150 farms that supplied the state’s food pantries with fresh produce, meat and dairy. One of them was Oaks and Sprouts, whose younger and diverse owners are just the type of growers the USDA’s Local Food Purchase Assistance program aimed to connect to food-insecure Americans.

Last growing season, Oaks and Sprouts had a contract worth up to $25,000 with the program, a significant amount for the small farm. The produce made its way to food pantries in nearby Springfield and Dayton and, from there, to the Ohioans who rely on them to feed themselves and their families. For Tonni Oberly, a trained doula with a background in public health, joining that distribution chain connected her work at the farm to the focus of the city and urban planning doctorate she had recently completed: how place impacts the health of Black mothers and children.