The shockwave of a Hobbs teen mom throwing her newborn into a dumpster a few weeks ago is vividly coupled by the reality that some people in Lea County are food insecure. Why else would three souls on that cold winter day have been dumpster diving looking for “anything of value” when they unsuspectingly found that infant. 

Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham is proposing a solution to the daily problem faced by many New Mexicans, including those in Lea County — simply not having enough to eat. 

The governor’s proposed program is called the Food, Farm and Hunger Initiative, and her administration is advocating “historic funding” to make the plan a reality. 

The initiative “will revolutionize New Mexico’s food system and expand effective federal and state nutrition programs, ensuring that thousands of food insecure New Mexicans have access to healthy meals,” states a January 28 press release issued by the governor’s office. 

The price tag for the new project, which will be administered by eight state agencies, is $24 million. 

“The administration’s proposed funding will deliver critical support to food banks and hunger relief.”

Initiative Provides Funding

The press release calls out, among other components, seven programs that will benefit from the statewide initiative. 

• Meal Gap Funding will be given to assist through food banks more than 125,000 high need, food insecure individuals of all ages statewide. 

• New Mexico Grown will receive funds to better provide some 70,000 people “locally produced fruits and vegetables, meat, nuts, and other foods in schools, senior centers, and preschools”. 

• Summer and Afterschool Nutrition Support will receive additional funding. This program gives grants for helping solve food insecurity during the summer and when school meals are unavailable. 

• The College Food Security Initiative will receive additional funds, offering 15,500 food insecure students “grab-and-go healthy meals, low cost or free access to campus dining plans, campus food pantries, and/or innovations to food distribution systems.” 

• Double Up Food Bucks will receive additional funding. The program helps more than 46,000 Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) recipients by giving “dollar-for-dollar incentives”… “to purchase New Mexico-grown fruits and vegetables at grocery stores, farmers’ markets, farm stands, and mobile markets”. 

• The Fruit and Vegetable Prescription Program will receive additional funding. The program provides weekly vouchers to residents of rural communities to purchase fruits and vegetables produced in New Mexico. 

• The Healthy Soils Program will, also, receive a financial boost. The program works with 64 land management projects with the goal of improving the health, yield and profitability of New Mexico’s soils.

One in Five New Mexicans Hunger Insecure 

New Mexico’s hunger problem is significant. “Hunger remains a constant in the lives of many New Mexicans. Every day, tens of thousands of people struggle to have enough food to eat,” states TheFoodDepot.org website. 

Referring to a study conducted by the New Mexico Association of Food Banks, the Food Depot website reports that during the pandemic one in three children and one in five people in the state have been at risk of hunger. Added to the problem is the reality that rural counties, like Lea, are especially hard hit with higher food costs. 

The New Mexico Association of Food Banks website states that each week 70,000 New Mexicans “seek food assistance”, and many of these individuals are not homeless and/or jobless. According to the website, “53% of households seeking emergency food assistance include at least one employed adult, and only 11% of the people seeking assistance are homeless.” 

In the press release from the governor’a office, Mag Strittmatter, president of the New Mexico Association of Food Banks, states that the financial support forthcoming from the governor’s Farm, Food and Hunger Initiative “is essential to assist the emergency hunger relief network in expanding its efforts to reach the growing number of hungry New Mexicans across the state.” 

Strittmatter goes on to say, “The members of the New Mexico Association of Food Banks are maxing out resources to address the growing food insecurity numbers in New Mexico. This initiative [the Farm, Food and Hunger Initiative] will provide the needed help to purchase and distribute millions of additional meals for our hungry neighbors.”

Hunger in Lea County 

Bringing the reality of the statewide hunger problem close to home, the Hobbs non-profit organization, Weekend Hunger Initiative (WHI) states on its website that “23% of Lea County’s children are food insecure”.

To help solve the problem, the WHI “delivers bags of food to Hobbs ISD students who are food insecure over the weekends.”

In addition to the WHI, other nonprofits in Lea County like Isaiah’s Soup Kitchen provide warm meals and food boxes to those in need. The Lovington Food Coalition, the Salvation Army Food Bank and Manna Outreach also help, as does the United Way; this organization spotlights Sissy’s Food Ministry. 

Donations and volunteers are always needed and most welcome by all of these non-profits. Contact the individual organizations directly to learn exactly how to help.

Photo by Segfried Poepperl / Unsplash