MAHA Food Boxes Could Replace SNAP, Senior Food & More Low Income Relief

[bucolic_frolic]

[underpants]

1. Get your rations! Get your rations!

[JBTaurus83]

2. I bet

the quality will be just wonderful too.

[bucolic_frolic]

3. At one point she says the Feds pay private companies to assemble the boxes - $45 each

And volunteers staff delivery in many areas, or it's handed over to private delivery (DoorDash), or there is a distribution point.

Why not give people Vegetable Only dollars for the supermarket? Piggyback on existing delivery.

This is a legacy program that's morphed many times, from Depression era agricultural surpluses to The Great Society's Food Stamps to Reagan's surplus cheese (which was sold off privately to Kraft I think and now houses cheese in underground caverns to the programs that exist today but won't exist much longer.

The video explains the difficulty of distributing fresh and frozen and canned together. No one is equipped to handle this change, except maybe supermarket home delivery.

Don't worry though! RFKJr is on the case!

[Ars Longa]

4. Guess who's face and signature--will be all over the

packaging for this stuff??
C'mon take a guess......

[Greg_In_SF]

5. Already happening

in Philadelphia and it's helping seniors.

[bucolic_frolic]

6. Is there a link to MAHA in Philly already? I can't find one.

I see that it was proposed in May, but no changes yet.

[Greg_In_SF]

8. It's being done

on the local level in Philly and it seems to be working.

[bucolic_frolic]

18. The Senior Food Box program is a federal program not a local one

If they are running a test, which organizations are handling it?

[Torchlight]

9. Evidence to support assertion?

[Greg_In_SF]

11. Link...

https://www.sharefoodprogram.org/find-food/

[Torchlight]

15. I think you're conflating orgs

[WhiskeyGrinder]

16. That's an org that distributes food as part of the Commodity Supplemental Food Program, which is going to be cut in

favor of "MAHA boxes."

[Wiz Imp]

25. You don't know what you're talking about.

The organization you linked to Share Food Program is a social services organization working for hunger relief in the Philadelphia region of Pennsylvania, United States. It serves as a food bank to the communities in accordance with USDA civil rights regulations and feeds more than 1 million people each month in Philadelphia and the suburbs. Share Food Program is the largest hunger-relief agency in the Greater Philadelphia area. In addition, it's affiliated with many different FEDERAL assistance programs including: CSFP (Commodity Supplemental Food Program), FMNP (Farmers Market Nutrition Program), NSLP (National School Lunch Program), SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program), and TEFAP (The Emergency Food Assistance Program). These programs are operated in every state and overseen by the USDA.

The video in this post is about a Trump Administration plan is to replace the CSFP and possibly all of the rest of those USDA programs (including others which I didn't list).

This article explains it as well:

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-maha-food-box-replace-csfp-low-income-seniors/
Trump wants to replace grocery aid for seniors with "MAHA food boxes"

"President Trump's proposed budget for next year could include big changes for a small food aid program that helps low-income senior citizens supplement their diets. Under the plan, funding for the program — called the Commodity Supplemental Food Program (CSFP) — would be cut, and seniors instead would receive what the Trump administration is calling "MAHA food boxes" filled with products sourced directly from farmers.

The CSFP helps about 730,000 low-income seniors annually through its $389 million budget, according to the USDA. By comparison, the food-stamp program spent about $100 billion last year to provide assistance to 41 million Americans, according to the USDA.

"MAHA boxes would be more wholesome foods, and similar to the Farmers to Families Food Box, fresh foods," the agency said. It added that "the most obvious" benefit would be "the removal of administrative middlemen from the distribution of food." The Farmers to Families Food Box, a pandemic food program that ran from May 2020 to May 2021, relied on more than 200 contractors to deliver millions of boxes to needy families, according to a 2021 analysis from the U.S. Government Accountability Office. The study found that the 21 biggest contractors were collectively awarded $3 billion to deliver the boxes.

The video explains how this program was a disaster. It was full of waste, fraud & abuse that served to line the pockets of many contractors, many of which had no experience or expertise in food assistance.

In the meantime, Matysik said he's worried about the future of the CSFP program and the seniors who rely on it. "Our seniors in particular are already hurting," he said. "We're hearing about cuts to the SNAP program. We're seeing about cuts to Medicaid and Medicare. We're really worried about our senior citizens in this funding environment from our federal government right now."

More on the disastrous pandemic program which they want to pattern this after.

https://thehill.com/opinion/finance/549059-ending-the-food-box-program-was-the-right-move/
Ending the food box program was the right move

Trying to achieve multiple goals with the same program often leads to inefficient and costly outcomes and the food box program was no exception. First, the food box program duplicated efforts of a long standing USDA program, the Emergency Food Assistance Program (EFAP). It contracted with new vendors, many of which had no experience in running food distribution programs. Many counties were unserved because of distribution issues, including many rural counties. Moreover, distribution costs were often absorbed by food pantries, food banks and other nonprofits that were already struggling to meet the increased demand for food caused by the pandemic.

And the program was costly. As outlined in a recent Harvard study, while the cost of an average food box was around $30, the unit costs varied widely with some boxes costing as high as $200. Contents of the boxes varied from week to week so those picking up the boxes did not always know what they were getting from week to week. So-called combo boxes included dairy products and fruits and vegetables, which often necessitated unpacking and sorting boxes at food banks. There were food safety challenges as well as boxes of meat and dairy sometimes went without refrigeration for extended periods at distribution sites.

Because of the slow recovery and lingering impacts of the pandemic, emergency food demand remains high. Feeding America reports a 55 percent increase in the number of people seeking help from food banks during the pandemic. Providing assistance to food banks and food pantries to meet those demands is a more cost-effective way of meeting emergency food assistance needs than through inefficient programs such as the food box program. It is far better for USDA to use its existing food distribution programs like EFAP that have a long history of providing funding for food bank purchases

[WhiskeyGrinder]

12. "MAHA" is not already happening. In Philly, you're likely thinking of the Commodity Supplemental Food Program, which is

highly effective, and is what's going to be cut in favor of a completely new program that doesn't follow existing logistical structures or policies.

[JCMach1]

23. Because they havent find the RW billionaire who can grift

Off of it yet

[BoRaGard]

7. GOP is stomping out free will

wherever they can

[LoisB]

10. I'll trade my peanut butter for your cheese.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

24. We made many such trades in the Army, way back ...

... when C-rations were the normal field food (for me, mid-1960's).

You got "Ham and Lima Beans" today? HaHa, nobody will trade with you!

[LoisB]

27. I imagine so. I know C-rations were discontinued, is the military doing MREs now for field

operations?

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

28. I think so, but MRE menu doesn't include "Ham and Lima Beans"

And the little accessory packs no longer have cigarettes and matches.

Times change

[leftstreet]

13. Sigh. How does this funnel to private profiteers?

That's the only motivation here

Make American public dollars Private!!

[bucolic_frolic]

19. Exactly

Small regional canners sell to these programs, and companies assemble the boxes for profit. She says it in the video. County and church organizations often distribute the boxes.

[leftstreet]

20. Yep

And then all those "non-profit" orgs can get $ubsidies to distribute

Argh!

[Cosmocat]

21. Winner, winner, chicken dinner

nm

[Harker]

14. Time to view "Soylent Green" again.

[Drum]

17. Filled with unsellable soybeans, grown by subsidized American farmers.

[Efilroft Sul]

22. Brought to you by the Department of Harm and Human Sacrifices.

[marble falls]

26. Bread AND circuses, yippee shit!

[Cha]

29. Fuck them.. That's Stupid.