Texas food bank programs feed 3 million individual
Texans each year, including 1.2 million children. Texas
is second in the nation in child hunger – 1 in 4 Texas
children lives in a “food insecure” household.
Hunger Facts
Feeding and Educational Programs
Social Services Outreach and
Community Partner Interviewer Project
Social Services Outreach - A cooperative agreement between Texas Food Bank Network and the Texas Health and Human Service Commission (HHSC) enables Network Members to provide education and outreach to Texans who wish to apply for Texas benefits such as: SNAP (food stamps), CHIP, TANF, and Medicaid. Community Partner Interviewer Project –Added to the outreach grant in March 2010, this project allows food bank Outreach Staff trained by HHSC to perform SNAP interviews.
SNAP (Food Stamp) Program – Key to addressing the nutritional needs of low-income Texas families and one of the nation's most important defenses against hunger. However, many barriers to participation remain. Nationally, only 60 percent of those eligible for food stamps receive them. In Texas, less than 58 percent of those eligible receive food stamps.
Texans Feeding Texans
The Surplus Agricultural Grant Program (Texans Feeding Texans) is an innovative partnership between the Texas Department of Agriculture, the agricultural community, and the Texas Food Bank Network. The program offers growers an incentive to donate fresh produce that would otherwise be left in the field, by offsetting a donor's costs of harvesting and packaging surplus product and supplying the necessary transportation.- Created to facilitate the donation of surplus product to feed low-income families across Texas. The program creates a direct link between Texas-based commodity producers, processors, food banks emergency food providers, and low-income families.
- Launched in March 2002
- Since the programs inception, TFBN members have distributed over 35 million pounds of fresh product throughout the state.
Texas Fresh Approach
TFBN also initiated a pilot project named Texas Fresh Approach (TFA) with the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. From its origins in Houston, the statewide TFA initiative now provides hungry Texans with a wide array of fresh vegetables planted and harvested by Texas inmates on surplus Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) farmland. In addition to planting and harvesting, inmates in some areas also glean fields. The produce is transported to food banks for distribution to charitable member agencies throughout the state of Texas. The program, the first of its kind in the nation, maximizes the resources of the prison system and Texas food banks. The result is a grand illustration of how the public and private sector can work successfully together to solve the serious problem of hunger.
Texas Second Chance
Texas Second Chance is a partnership between the Texas Department of Criminal Justice and Food Banks across the state of Texas. The program is designed to give inmates a “second chance” to develop job skills, be a productive member of their community and give back.
- Started in 1997
- Program targets full-time incarcerated men
- Last year participants in the Texas Second Chance program worked 95,459 hours and handled 162,140,296 pounds of product at eight food banks in the state.
- Duties: Sorting, sanitizing and packing donations prior to delivery to agencies – as well as other warehouse duties.
- Program provides professional training in warehousing and inventory skills. Also allows participants to become certified in the operation and use of warehouse machinery.
- At some food banks, participants attend a one-hour class where they receive instruction and hear from guest speakers.
