A “SNAP welcomed here” sign is seen at the entrance to a Big Lots store in Portland, Oregon. (Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — More than 42 million low-income Americans are at risk of losing food assistance Nov. 1 if the government shutdown continues.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture, which operates the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, has about $6 billion in a multi-year contingency fund. That’s short of the roughly $9 billion needed to cover a full month of the program.

Even if a shutdown deal were reached immediately, the time needed to process the payments and make them available for recipients means benefits would likely be delayed.

The shortfall is caused by the shutdown, which hit its 22nd day Wednesday. The fund is supposed to maintain a balance of about $9 billion, but $3 billion of the funds expired at the end of the fiscal year Sept. 30. Because Congress has not approved the next year’s funding, the fund only has $6 billion.

USDA would have to come up with the remaining $3 billion. The department could try something similar to its shuffle of more than $300 million in tariff revenue into its Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, or WIC, through the rest of the month. 

It’s unclear if USDA plans to use the SNAP contingency fund or any other maneuvers to extend benefits.

Nearly 40% of the 42 million SNAP recipients nationwide are children 17 and younger, according to the USDA. About 20% are seniors aged 60 and older and the remaining 40% are adults aged 18 to 59.

USDA did not respond to multiple requests for comment from States Newsroom.

Parties in Congress remained nowhere near a deal to end the shutdown as of Wednesday.

States scrambling

A Democratic congressional staffer familiar with the SNAP program said that even if Congress passes a stopgap before Nov. 1, the month’s benefits will still be delayed because it takes time to process the benefits and there are limited vendor processors.

The program issues electronic benefits on a card that can be used like cash to purchase food. States will upload either all or part of a month’s benefits on the first day of the month.

Even in states that say they have enough funds to extend SNAP through November, such as North Dakota, state officials have said they are unable to load the funds on the cards. 

Kansas officials said once Congress passes a stopgap, the state can distribute benefits to the state’s 188,000 SNAP recipients within 72 hours, meaning any deal would have to be completed by next week to avoid an interruption of services. 

Other states, including Minnesota, have halted new enrollments in SNAP. 

Wisconsin’s Gov. Tony Evers warned that 700,000 residents are at risk of losing their SNAP benefits. 

Tennessee officials have informed SNAP recipients — nearly 700,000 people — that it received notice from USDA that SNAP funding will cease entirely on Nov. 1 if the government shutdown doesn’t end.

Unheeded warnings

USDA on Oct. 10  warned states to hold off on sending SNAP files to electronic benefit transfer vendors due to the government shutdown

“Considering the operational issues and constraints that exist in automated systems, and in the interest of preserving maximum flexibility, we are forced to direct States to hold their November issuance files and delay transmission to State EBT vendors until further notice,” SNAP acting Associate Administrator Ronald Ward wrote. 

“This includes on-going SNAP benefits and daily files,” Ward continued. 

Last week, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said that SNAP will run out of funds by the end of the month if Congress fails to strike a deal and end the government shutdown.

An Oakland, Calif., grocery store displays a sign notifying shoppers that it accepts electronic benefit transfer cards used by state welfare departments to issue food assistance benefits. States are just beginning to implement changes to work requirements for the national food stamp program approved by Congress and President Donald Trump this summer. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

States are rushing to inform some residents who rely on food stamps that they will soon be forced to meet work requirements or lose their food assistance.

Recent federal legislation ended exemptions to work requirements for older adults, homeless people, veterans and some rural residents, among others. A rapid timeline to put the changes into effect has sparked chaos in state agencies that must cut off access if residents don’t meet certain work, education or volunteer reporting requirements.

States are implementing these permanent changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program — commonly called food stamps — amid the uncertainty of the federal government shutdown. The budget impasse could result in millions of Americans not getting their SNAP benefits next month if money runs out. But even before the shutdown, states were assessing the new work rules for food stamps — the first in a wave of cutbacks to the nation’s largest food assistance program required under President Donald Trump’s major tax and spending law enacted in July.

Known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, the law mandates cuts to social service programs, including Medicaid and food stamps. In the coming years, the law will require states to pay a greater share of administering SNAP and could cause millions of Americans to lose benefits.

But states are currently confronting the end of exceptions to work requirements for older adults, homeless people, veterans and those recently living in foster care. Those could threaten benefits even for people who are working but who may struggle with the paperwork to prove they’re meeting the requirements, advocates say.

Under the new law, states have also lost funding for nutrition education programs, must end eligibility for noncitizens such as refugees and asylees, and will lose work requirement waivers for those living in areas with limited employment opportunities.

And the federal government wants those changes made quickly.

“They’ve given us a virtually nonexistent window — I’ll just describe it that way — in which to implement the changes, so we are working on them very quickly,” Andrea Barton Reeves, commissioner of the Connecticut Department of Social Services, told lawmakers last week.

She said changing work requirements could threaten the benefits of tens of thousands of people in Connecticut.

“We do believe that if we cannot in some way either move them into another exemption category or they don’t meet the requirements, we have about 36,000 people in these new categories that are at risk of losing their SNAP benefit,” Barton Reeves told lawmakers.

The federal government issued guidance to states earlier this month saying several key changes to food stamps would need to be implemented by early November.

The Food Research & Action Center, a nonprofit working to address poverty-related hunger, characterized that deadline as an “unreasonable” timeline for states.

In California, for example, the state previously had been approved for a waiver to work requirements through January 2026. But this month, USDA told states they had 30 days to terminate waivers issued under the previous guidelines. In California, the end of that waiver could affect benefits for an estimated 359,000 people.

Gina Plata-Nino, interim SNAP director at the Food Research & Action Center, said states must quickly train their social services workers on eligibility changes, communicate those changes to the public and deal with an onslaught of calls from people relying on the program.

“It’s incredibly complex,” she said.

Plata-Nino said implementation will be uneven: Some states are already in compliance with the changes, while others will phase them in as households go through regular eligibility reviews.

USDA and the White House did not respond to Stateline’s questions about the changes.

Republicans, including House Speaker Mike Johnson of Louisiana, have said the cuts would eliminate waste in the food assistance program. In a June news release, he characterized SNAP as a “bloated, inefficient program,” but said Americans who needed food assistance would still receive it.

“Democrats will scream ‘cuts,’ but what they’re really defending is a wasteful program that discourages work, mismanages billions, and traps people in dependency. Republicans are proud to defend commonsense welfare reform, fiscal sanity, and the dignity of work,” Johnson said in the release.

Rural residents

Changes to work requirements will prove especially burdensome for rural residents, who already disproportionately rely on SNAP. Job opportunities and transportation are often limited in rural areas, making work requirements especially difficult, according to Plata-Nino.

“None of these bills came with a job offer,” Plata-Nino said. “None of them came with additional funding to address the lack of transportation. Remote and rural areas don’t have public transportation — they don’t even have taxis or Ubers.”

With waivers, states previously could show USDA evidence that certain areas had limited job opportunities, thus exempting people from work requirements.

“Because it doesn’t make sense to punish SNAP participants for not being able to find a job when there are no jobs available, right?” said Lauren Bauer, a fellow in economic studies at the left-leaning Brookings Institution and the associate director of The Hamilton Project, an economic policy initiative.

The legislation changed the criteria for proving weak labor markets to what Bauer characterized as an “utterly insane standard,” of showing unemployment rates above 10%. (The national unemployment rate was 4.3% in August, according to the most recently released figures by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.)

“The national economy during the Great Recession hit 10% in one month,” Bauer said. “Ten percent unemployment is a very, very high level. So they set this standard basically to end the waiver process.”

That change will not only affect recipients now but also will drastically impair the program’s ability to respond to recessions: Traditionally, SNAP has quickly helped people who lose their jobs. But the new law requires states to cover more costs, meaning they will be stretched even thinner during economic downturns when demand increases.

“Not only are these changes difficult to implement — and certainly at the speed that the administration is asking for — they could be devastating to the program, to residents who are in need in their states, and eventually SNAP may no longer be a national program because states will not be able to afford to participate,” Bauer said.

‘Widespread confusion’

Since July, Pennsylvania officials have been working to not only inform the public about the federal changes, but also to update information technology systems — a process that generally takes a minimum of 12 months.

“Strictly speaking from an IT perspective, we’re talking about massive systems that generate terabytes of data and are working with records for hundreds of thousands — and in the case of Pennsylvania, 2 million people,” said Hoa Pham, deputy secretary of the Office of Income Maintenance for the Pennsylvania Department of Human Services.

Pham said the timing of the federal legislation and lagging guidance from USDA was “simply not ideal.” But the state is doing its best to train thousands of employees on the changes and help affected recipients get into compliance by finding work, education or volunteer opportunities that meet federal guidelines.

The end of geographic waivers put the benefits of about 132,000 SNAP recipients at risk in Pennsylvania.

“It is difficult, it requires time, it requires planning, it requires money,” she told Stateline. “And I want to be super clear that H.R. 1 [the new law] delivered a ton of unfunded mandates to state agencies.”

Pennsylvania created a detailed webpage outlining the changes and will notify individuals if their eligibility is jeopardized in the coming months. Pham said those who depend on SNAP should make sure their contact information is up to date with both the department and the post office.

“As a state agency, we’re working very hard to make sure that people have accurate, factual information when it is most immediately necessary for them to know it,” she said.

States are implementing the SNAP changes even as the ongoing federal government shutdown might temporarily cost recipients their benefits.

New Hampshire leaders say they are days away from running out of food stamp funds. No new applications will be approved in Minnesota until the government is reopened, officials announced last week.

And the changes hit agencies already strained from staffing shortages and outdated software, said Brittany Christenson, the CEO of AidKit, a vendor that helps states administer SNAP and other public benefits.

“The result is widespread confusion among both administrators and beneficiaries, as states are tasked with integrating new compliance requirements while maintaining service continuity.

“The changes not only increase workloads for states, but they can lead to more errors and longer wait time or applicants,” Christenson said.

“Beneficiaries face a heightened risk of losing aid not because they are unwilling to work, but because they cannot meet new documentation or compliance requirements on time,” she said.

Slow trickle of changes

In Maine, the new work requirement rules are in place, but recipients have some time to meet the altered guidelines, the Portland Press Herald reported. The state estimates changes to work requirements could affect more than 40,000 recipients as soon as this fall.

The state’s Department of Health and Human Services did not respond to Stateline requests for comment. But advocates said food banks are already struggling to keep up with increased demand and decreased supply because of the high cost of food.

“They’re seeing huge increases in families and individuals showing up, needing groceries, needing food every month, some every week, and that’s before any of these cuts to SNAP have happened. So we’re really, we’re very worried,” said Anna Korsen, deputy director of Full Plates Full Potential, a nonprofit focused on ending childhood hunger in Maine.

More than 70% of Maine households receiving SNAP have at least one person working, Korsen said. While some recipients — including those who are caretakers for relatives — cannot work, many more who are employed will struggle to meet documentation requirements.

“They call them work requirements, but we’ve started calling them work reporting requirements, because we think that’s a more accurate way to portray what they are,” she said.

Alex Carter, policy advocate at the nonprofit legal aid organization Maine Equal Justice, said SNAP recipients will be affected on a rolling basis because of regular six-month eligibility reviews. For example, a 59-year-old who previously would have been exempt from the work requirement may not be notified until next month that their eligibility status is in jeopardy.

“So people are not going to be losing their benefits this month because of those changes, which I think is the thing that is hard to explain to people,” she said. “These things are happening, but we can’t tell people this will happen to you in October or this will happen to you in January. It’s different on a case-by-case basis.”

Carter said her organization is urging Mainers to ensure their contact information is correct with the state and to remain vigilant for official communications on SNAP.

While states are forced to implement the federal changes, Carter said they should emphasize they’re only the messengers. She said Congress and the president should be held responsible for the fallout when people begin losing benefits.

‘It’s very natural to think this is a state decision, or this is a departmental decision, and to direct your anger and your frustration there,” she said. “ … In this case, this is not a state decision. They are required by federal law to implement these work reporting changes.”

Stateline reporter Kevin Hardy can be reached at khardy@stateline.org. 

Some USDA office functions will be suspended during the government shutdown. (USDA Photo by Lance Cheung)

Nearly half of U.S. Department of Agriculture employees will be furloughed during the federal government shutdown, though key programs that support nutrition, forest preservation and wildfire prevention, the most pressing plant and animal diseases and agricultural commodity assessments will continue.

Many offices, including county USDA service centers, will be closed or operating with minimal staff until Congress agrees on a temporary spending package. Support, payment processing and other functions of these offices are also suspended during the shutdown.

Congress failed to pass a stopgap spending bill Tuesday which resulted in the start of a government shutdown at midnight and federal agencies had to implement the contingency plans required by the Office of Management and Budget.

According to the contingency plan filed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, only a handful of agency operations will continue during the shutdown. The primary objective is that agencies cannot incur financial obligations if the funding source has lapsed and any planned or in-the-works activities that would incur new obligations, must cease. 

Activities that may continue during the shutdown include those that are financed by something other than current year appropriations, expressly authorized to continue, either by law or by necessary implication, necessary to the presidential duties and powers or related to emergencies that endanger human life or the protection of property.

According to the plan, more than 42,000 USDA employees are expected to be furloughed during the shutdown. That’s about half of the more than 85,000 employees the agency said would be “on board” prior to the shutdown. 

USDA programs that will continue despite the shutdown: 

• Farm loan processing.
• Certain natural resources and conservation programs that are mandatory under the farm bill or to protect human life and private property, like the Emergency Watershed Protection Program, dam safety and rehab work, the National Water and Climate Center which tracks flooding and weather risks and the National Soil Survey Center. 
• “Core” nutrition safety net programs. This includes SNAP and child nutrition programs which have funding appropriations through October. The Women Infants and Children, or WIC, program is set to continue through the shutdown “subject to the availability of funding.” According to the plan, WIC can “recover and reallocate” unused grant funding from previous years to cover gap in coverage. 
• Food safety operations, like inspections and laboratory testing.
• Wildfire preparation and response. 
• Activities like grading, assessment, inspection, import and export for farm commodities. These activities are supported by user fees and therefore not impacted by the shutdown.
• Emergency programs under USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service that address new world screwworm, highly pathogenic avian influenza, African swine fever, rabies and exotic fruit flies. Surveying for other plant and livestock diseases will cease during the shutdown. 
• Prior obligations in the Section 521 rental housing agreement program. This is the program element of USDA Rural Development offices that will persist.
• Operational requirements like human resource policies, cybersecurity and critical IT infrastructure. 

Under the contingency plan, USDA functions like ongoing research, reports, outreach and technical assistance are suspended. The agency will also stop processing payments and disaster assistance. 

Trade negotiations, hazardous fuel treatments, special use permits, regulatory work, training and travel by USDA employees and agencies are also suspended. 

According to the contingency plan, most functions are suspended for the Risk Management Agency, Natural Resources Conservation Service, Foreign Agricultural Service, Food and Nutrition Service, National Institute of Food and Agriculture, Economic Research Service, National Agricultural Statistical Service, Rural Development, and staff offices.

Website updates are also suspended under the shutdown. A banner atop the USDA website informs visitors that the website will not be updated “due to the Radical Left Democrat shutdown.” 

“President Trump has made it clear he wants to keep the government open and support those who feed, fuel, and clothe the American people,” the banner reads. 

According to the plan, “all activities will cease” for the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture and her office during the shutdown. 

Approximately 67% of Farm Service Agency, or FSA, employees will be furloughed. According to the plan, selected leadership at headquarters and USDA offices will stay on during the shut down. This means county service centers, and the majority of the services they offer, will not be available during the shutdown. 

Nearly all, 1135 out of 1237 employees, at the Food and Nutrition Service offices were projected to be furloughed during the shutdown, though according to the plan, enough employees remain to facilitate SNAP, child nutrition programs and WIC. WIC must make unspent funds from past years available in order to continue operations through October.

Close to 20,000 of the 32,390 Forest Service employees will continue to work on certain approved areas of agency work, like wildfire prevention, protection of federal land and federal directives to expand timber production. Public access to recreation sites managed by the department will be reduced, according to the plan. 

A significant portion of Agricultural Marketing Service operations are funded by previous farm bill appropriations or by user fees, so services like the Federal Grain Inspection Service and dairy grading will continue, as will market news information.

Operations like country of origin labeling, the packers and stockyards program, the national organic program, shell egg surveillance and the pesticide data program will be suspended. 

The plan calls for a number of reconsiderations in the event the shutdown persists longer than 5 days. This could include, for example a farm loan employee or other staff member on call at USDA service centers, or the reinstatement of some furloughed employees to deal with wildfire management. 

Glenn “GT” Thompson, chair of the House Committee on Agriculture, blamed Democrats, who demanded extentions to the Affordable Care Act be added to the stopgap spending bill, for shutting down the government and putting “critical USDA services in jeopardy.”

“These political games harm rural America through disruptions to farm payments, disaster relief, food assistance, and other critical services,” the Republican from Pennsylvania said in a statement. “Performative photo ops at state fairs and lip service to the producers who feed, fuel, and clothe our country won’t hide the truth—Democrats forcing a government shutdown only inflicts more pain on our agricultural economy.”

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Click here to read highlights from the story

• Juneau County has few grocery stores, and about one in seven county residents, often older and living on fixed incomes, struggles to make ends meet.

• The county partners with local producers to host pop-up distributions of healthy foodstuffs.

• The Local Food Purchase Assistance program allowed the county to host more than 30 pop-ups last year. Cuts by the Trump administration have reduced that to six, with local businesses backfilling funding.

• Donors and volunteers hope to keep the program alive.

On a recent Wednesday about 11 a.m., Dustin Ladd turned the ignition on the county’s Ford pickup. He left the office with a humming, refrigerated trailer in tow and wound along country roads through central Wisconsin, stopping at farms to pack the vehicle with food.

Dustin handled nearly all the retrievals and deliveries last year, too. He isn’t one to say “no.”

“It takes me to all sorts of places — good or bad,” said Dustin, 36, who has worked as Juneau County’s land and water conservation administrator for six years.

The county partnered with more than a dozen local producers to host countywide pop-up distributions of healthy foodstuffs in the Central Sands — one of Wisconsin’s most food-insecure regions.

About one in seven county residents, often older and living on fixed incomes, struggles to make ends meet.

There are few grocery stores. Even so, many folks can’t afford to shop at the county’s only supermarket. A loaf of off-brand bread costs $2.79, a gallon of milk $3.39 and a dozen eggs $3.49.

Residents often turn to local gas stations or dollar stores, without the luxury of variety.

County employees saw a need. And an opportunity.

They obtained a grant in 2024 to run a food distribution initiative — known as the Local Food Purchase Assistance program, or LFPA — and anticipated continuing it this year. 

The federal funding underlying the state program enabled the county to purchase food from more than a dozen area farmers, supporting the economy and residents in need.

But the newly elected Trump administration abruptly canceled the awards in March. Wisconsin would have received $5.5 million.

Additional cuts to the nation’s social safety net coincided with rising inflation that has pinched people’s pocketbooks and stretched food banks.

This year, Juneau County and local businesses backfilled the costs of running a significantly smaller program with just a fraction of the cash: six pop-up distributions. Not the previous 30-plus. Fewer nutritious meals fill stomachs, and the program’s future is unclear. 

Still, a dedicated team of county staff, donors and volunteers is working to ensure residents obtain something.

They find joy in that.

***

Three felines roam the grounds at Orange Cat Community Farm south of the Juneau County border.

The youngsters are the unrelated successors of the farm’s namesake cat, Little Ann. Before she died, the cat kept her human, Laura Mortimore, company as Laura grew three acres of organic vegetables.

Feeding the community through Juneau County’s LFPA program in 2024 felt awesome, said Laura, 43. Nothing went to waste.

“I feel like I made a bunch of new friends,” she said. “I just wanted to keep going.”

Dustin pulled into the farm’s driveway around 1:30 p.m. He and Laura started loading small watermelons and vegetables into the trailer, stacking plastic totes to its ceiling.

The vegetables are growing ravenously this year. Tomatoes are in. Butternut squash and pumpkins on the way.

The two strolled through Laura’s fields.

“I’m scared that I’m gonna have a lot of five-pound sweet potatoes,” she told him, burying her arms into a carpet of vines.

The monster tubers caused the soil to bulge out of the ground.

The farm overproduced in anticipation of a full year of pop-ups. Laura solicited additional customers and is adding extra produce to her subscribers’ food shares. She also threw away seedlings that she grew for the LFPA program.

“But this is really great to keep, you know…” Laura said, pausing. “Moving forward in some way.”

Maybe the local farmers and county staff could have another LFPA committee meeting, she told Dustin. How about applying for some grants?

But as they seek donations, they have to compete with other good causes.

Dustin recently put in an application for $10,000 from the local electric utility. He pondered the unlikely possibility of starting a nonprofit to maximize the Juneau County program’s eligibility.

Will staff be able to run the program next year?

They’re going to keep trying.

***

To Dustin’s knowledge, Juneau County is the only local government in Wisconsin to oversee an LFPA program.

Staff and local producers ironed out the details the first year: crafting business plans, purchasing equipment, charting trucking routes, arranging shifts and building community trust.

Volunteers and employees from the county’s Aging and Disability Resource Center and Land and Water Department passed out food at village halls, parks and fairgrounds.

It’s not easy starting a new service.

“A lot of weeks of late Wednesday nights,” Dustin said.

Deer also preyed upon vegetables growing in farmers’ fields. Wild storms dropped hailstones across rows of sweet corn and apple orchards. One farmer lost about 200 pounds of ground beef when someone left a freezer door ajar.

But the trailer continued to visit all the major communities from May through January.

Sometimes, just 80 families came. Or as many as 200. Everyone left with something. Other than marking their township, age group and household size on a paper slip, no questions asked.

The county ultimately gave away about 4,500 food shares.

The only thing that’s still missing is the promised money to fuel the well-oiled machine.

Amid the polarized politics in Washington, there’s one glimmer of bipartisanship: the Strengthening Local Food Security Act, introduced in July by Sens. Jim Justice, R-West Virginia, and Jack Reed, D-Rhode Island.

The bill would allocate $200 million each year for states to pay farmers and fishers to sell goods to food providers and schools.

Reed called the new proposal a “win-win-win” for local producers, domestic supply chains and hunger relief agencies. He hopes to see the provisions included in the federal farm bill, which sets the nation’s agricultural policies and spending plan.

In Wisconsin, state lawmakers also set aside $10 million in the current two-year state budget for assistance groups to purchase Wisconsin-made foodstuffs.

***

At  3:15 p.m. Dustin rolled into Lyndon Station, a village of 500 residents. He headed to Travis Fitzgerald Memorial Park. Volunteers emptied the trailer and arranged the veggie totes atop impromptu serving tables under a picnic shelter.

Gina Laack, director of the Juneau County Aging and Disability Resource Center, dished out pumpkin bars and brownies as she welcomed arrivals.

The trickle of pedestrians turned into a stream, then a chattering crowd. Volunteers handed out registration forms and carried groceries to people’s cars, which now lined the street. More than 120 arrived that afternoon. 

Some pushed walkers, others leaned on canes. A woman crinkled her face as she limped to the front of the line. Her sciatic nerves were acting up. 

For many, the program expands the foods they can access. Produce straight from the field, better than a food pantry. Each pop-up brings blessings instead of tears.

“You have to remember this is a healthy food distribution,” Gina said, as she carved up the brownie trays.

Dave Dearth, 77, has been coming to nearly every pop-up since LFPA started in Juneau County. He heard about it through the ADRC, which also runs the Men’s Shed social club and dementia classes he attends with his wife, Anna.

“It’s nice to get some fresh vegetables,” he said through tinted eyeglasses. “Just something to look forward to. See people that you know.” 

A retired counselor, Dave moved to the nearby city of Mauston to live close to his son. Dave picks up vegetables at the pop-ups he wouldn’t ordinarily buy. Growing up poor, he said, he learned to like eating everything.

Dave glanced at the bags of apples sitting atop the bar. Those don’t come cheap, he said.

Dave joined the line, and a volunteer handed him a sack loaded with a head of lettuce, a white onion, a red tomato, a green zucchini and a yellow squash. Another passed him a packet of ground beef.

Behind Dave, Anna adjusted her short blond hair and smiled.

By 4:30, the shelter hollowed out, but extra food remained. 

Gina looped through the village — home to Mac’s Stumble Out Pub and the Swagger Inn — peeking into the local bars and grills. She beckoned people to the park.

“I will not have a beer at each of the bars!” she insisted as she left the shelter.

Seven minutes later, Gina returned with a train of locals — one dressed in denim overalls and a conductor’s hat.

He approached the serving line.

“Well, I’m hungry,” he said.

The LFPA crew swung into motion.

Wisconsin county keeps healthy food program alive despite federal cuts is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.