Focusing on Senior Hunger at the Texas Legislature

NTFB partnered with The Senior Source to highlight the needs of seniors and older adults in North Texas as lawmakers prepared for the 89th Texas Legislature.

Older adults are now the fastest-growing age demographic in Texas, and in the Dallas area alone, this segment of our population is increasing at five times the rate of any other age group. By 2030, nearly one in five Texans will be 65 or older. This growth warrants attention in the 89th State Legislative Session and requires public policymakers to be intentional in their action, as we all deserve to age with dignity in a state with protections and resources in place for older adults.

To highlight the importance of issues impacting seniors, North Texas Food Bank joined The Senior Source, Dallas Area Gerontology Society, Secure Our Seniors’ Safety, Alzheimer’s Association and Visiting Nurse Association for a State Legislative Forum in December meant to inform legislators and their staff about the issues important to older adults and the people who care for them.

 When it comes to hunger, Texas has the third-highest number of food-insecure seniors in the country, behind California and Florida, with an estimated 546,800 people who are 60 and older facing hunger. Among older adults, or those older than 50, Texas ranks No. 1 in hunger. When those groups are combined, it means more than 1 million older adults in Texas don’t know where their next meal will come from.

NTFB addresses this through its Commodity Supplemental Food Program (CSFP) box distribution, run in partnership with the USDA, as well as through its partner pantries. Through these programs, NTFB provided access to 14 million physical meals during the last fiscal year, including more than 7,300 CSFP boxes per month.

Clarissa Clarke, NTFB Government Relations Officer, shared with representatives and older adults in attendance at the forum that many of NTFB and Feeding Texas’ legislative priorities are critical for the well-being of seniors. Here’s a look at a few of those priorities and how they impact older adults:

  • Feeding Texas and NTFB believe increasing access to healthy food will improve health outcomes. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention suggest that food insecurity adds around $2 billion annually to healthcare costs in Texas. Access to nutritious food can help prevent health issues, chronic disease and the costs associated with them. More than 4 million Texans receive healthcare through the Medicaid program, and nearly all are enrolled in a managed care organization that has the flexibility to provide services, such as food is medicine interventions. Additionally, a streamlined Medicaid reimbursement model that integrates food bank services into our healthcare system would enable doctors to prescribe healthy food and improve health outcomes for Texas seniors (and others).
  • Lawmakers can fight child hunger by implementing Summer EBT. We know that many grandparents are raising their grandchildren, and we hear from them that summer puts a strain on their household as the end of school meal programs mean they must provide up to 10 additional meals each week per child. Summer EBT is a brand-new USDA program that allows low-income families with school-aged children to receive additional benefits when schools are closed. An estimated 3.75 million Texas children could receive around $450 million in federal food aid through Summer EBT. Without it, our Feeding Network is strained to provide these additional resources to grandparents and other caregivers who visit pantries.
  • NTFB and Feeding Texas are calling on lawmakers to streamline SNAP six-month eligibility checks. Applications for SNAP, formerly known as food stamps, have a significant backlog meaning many eligible Texans go months without critical food assistance. Health and Human Services require SNAP recipients to provide updated information about their household circumstance every six months to ensure they are still eligible for benefits. By streamlining this six-month eligibility check using technology and verified data sources, it would reduce the workload on HHSC staff (who are manually doing these reviews now) and improve timeliness of benefit review. The change could also save over $33 million in state funds per year.
  • NTFB and Feeding Texas also support policies that tackle the root causes of hunger, including increasing access to healthcare, ensuring housing affordability and improving financial security as prices continue to rise for necessities like housing.

NTFB looks forward to the 89th Texas Legislature and to working with lawmakers to champion policies that support hunger relief for seniors, children and families across the state. To get involved in advocacy or if you have any questions about these issues, please contact Government Relations Officer Clarissa Clarke at clarissa.clarke@ntfb.org.

Rep. Toni Rose

Share: