Families, educators, food shelves brace for SNAP cutoff: ‘This is a policy choice’

October 31, 2025 by

Matteo Halbesleben speaks at a press conference outside a St. Paul food shelf.

Matteo Halbesleben of Minneapolis is among 42 million people nationwide, including 440,000 in Minnesota, who will see food assistance from the federal government, known as SNAP, disappear tomorrow.

Benny Roberts is executive director of the Hallie Q. Brown Food Shelf in St. Paul, where demand already has doubled this week, prompting staff to put out a call for donations – money, food, clothes, toiletries and volunteer help.

Devina Moore teaches at nearby Benjamin E. Mays elementary school, where over half of students qualify for free or reduced school lunch. She and other educators are trying to keep things “as consistent as possible” for children – 150,000 of whom rely on SNAP in Minnesota – while scrambling to connect families with other resources.

As they brace for the impacts on their families and their community, Halbesleben, Roberts, Moore and others are also calling out the driving force behind the SNAP cutoff and ongoing federal government shutdown.

“Greed,” Roberts said during a press conference outside his food shelf in the city’s Rondo neighborhood, arranged by unions, faith groups and progressive organizations.

“This isn’t a charity issue,” St. Paul school board member Erica Valliant added. “This is a policy choice.”

Sitting on $5 billion

The motive behind that choice, union leaders say, is especially callous – an attempt by President Donald Trump and Republicans to use hunger as political leverage. Why else would the administration refuse to release more than $5 billion in SNAP contingency funds?

The AFL-CIO and 26 labor unions today sent a letter demanding Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins release the contingency funding. AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler said Trump is “deliberately inflicting pain on workers by cutting jobs, slashing food assistance and ripping away livelihoods.”

“The administration could continue SNAP without a hitch,” she added. “Instead, it’s inflicting cruelty on people and treating this crisis as some sick political game.”

SNAP cuts will only add to the pain inflicted on workers during the shutdown.

The administration has forced 730,000 federal workers to do their jobs without pay, locked 670,000 federal workers out of their jobs, threatened to destroy 130,000 health care jobs and sidelined hundreds of thousands of workers in construction, transportation and energy by canceling infrastructure projects.

Pain spreads

As the shutdown enters a second month, more Minnesotans, like Halbesleben, will feel the pain.

He began accessing SNAP benefits several years ago, after a string of health crises – skin cancer, reconstructive surgery and a car accident – left him unable to work. Halbesleben is now able to work part time, but still cannot stand for more than four hours without needing to lie down for a physical-therapy exercise that resets his rib cage.

“My story is my own, but there are other stories out there – people who have families who are trying to keep their kids fed, elderly (people) who can’t work anymore and whose retirement doesn’t pay enough for them to (buy) food.”

He said SNAP benefits allow him to put money he does earn toward keeping his home. He already lost the home where lived at the beginning of his health troubles.

Valliant and Moore said they worry that losing SNAP benefits will create a similar snowball effect for SPPS families, making it even harder to afford housing, transportation, energy and other costs.

“It’s overwhelming to see what our families are already going through, the needs that they already have,” Moore said. “Our youngest citizens are being affected the most, and they can’t do for themselves.”

‘We need community’

Valliant noted that Minnesota students will continue to have access to free breakfast and lunch on school days, and Gov. Tim Walz and some counties have tapped emergency funds to help prepare local food shelves like Hallie Q. Brown for a surge in demand.

But it won’t replace SNAP.

“For every meal a food shelf provides, SNAP provides nine,” Valliant said. “We’d be hard pressed to replace that with donations and good will alone, and we should not have to.”

Roberts agreed, calling the shutdown a continuation of “overt and covert practices that pick on the vulnerable for the profit of the comfortable” – a nod to the political fight behind the government shutdown, which pits tax cuts for the wealthy against funding that keeps clinics open and health insurance affordable.

“We’re going to brace for harm – in community,” Roberts said. “We’re going to support each other – in community. We’re going to do our best, but we need community.”

Looking to access food, donate or volunteer with a local food shelf? Click here for a map of locations across Minnesota.

– Michael Moore, Union Advocate editor

Filed Under: Community, Union Events Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , ,

St. Paul unions stepped up to help feed families in our community – and beyond

May 25, 2021 by

By Erica Dalager Reed, AFL-CIO Community Services liaison

I was first blessed to work with the USDA’s Farmers to Families food box program as the executive director of a congregation in St. Paul’s Midway neighborhood. The goal was to help people experiencing food insecurities obtain fresh food on a regular basis. The COVID-19 pandemic has been economically devastating to many across the U.S., and the Farmers to Families program offered free, fresh food to anyone who needed it.

But it quickly became evident to me that, when it came to the distribution of mass quantities of food, organized labor was the best partner to have.

At each Farmers to Families food event, we give away a truckload of food containing about 1,300 boxes of food weighing 30 pounds each and 1,300 gallons of milk. At our first labor distribution event last October at the St. Paul Labor Center, the St. Paul Building Trades secured a forklift and operator. Other unions came with a pallet jack. And the St. Paul Regional Labor Federation recruited volunteers to help unload and distribute the food. All told, some 75 union and community volunteers joined the event.

We learned a lot that day. First and foremost, we saw that the need in the community was great. People were hungry. The line of cars down West 7th Street was endless. And everyone that came through was so relieved and grateful to be receiving food. The most-asked question our volunteers heard was, “When are you doing this again?” It was wonderful, in the darkest days of the pandemic, to see fellow union members safely and help our neighbors.

From that initial event at the Labor Center, our vision at the St. Paul Labor Studies and Resource Center grew, and we saw an opportunity to help our neighbors in need across the state of Minnesota. We began securing trucks full of food for communities across the metro, as well as Duluth, Long Prairie, St. Cloud, Rochester, Mankato, Milaca, North Branch, Proctor, Hibbing, Virginia, Worthington, Winona, Eveleth, Mahnomen, Owatonna, Red Lake, Cass Lake, Monticello and East Grand Forks. Unions in North Dakota were able to host nine events throughout their state. Unions in Wisconsin, South Dakota, Arizona and Washington participated as well.

Ironworkers Local 512 event in St. Paul
Painters and Allied Trades District Council 82 event in Little Canada
St. Paul Regional Labor Federation President Kera Peterson and Mayor Melvin Carter unload food at an event hosted by IBEW Local 110 on the East Side.
Painters and Allied Trades District Council 82 event in Little Canada
Letter Carriers Branch 28 event in Maplewood
Chisago County Labor Assembly event in North Branch

In all, our nonprofit helped distribute over 60 truckloads of food, lifting up people in need in the east metro and beyond. Each food event brought together labor partners, union members, community members, churches and nonprofits, working toward the common goal of feeding people in need. Time and time again, labor led the way, providing the space, equipment, resources, relationships and volunteers necessary to ensure each event was a success.

We saw people walk, ride their bikes and drive through the contactless distribution lines. Everyone was welcome, no questions asked. Despite our best efforts, some folks couldn’t help but get out of their vehicles to offer up a hug, a handshake or a few tears. Many were overwhelmed by labor’s generosity. Strangers to the movement became allies and partners, delivering food to neighbors, small non-profits, churches and group homes. If someone reached out with a need, labor was there to assist in delivering food.

The Farmers to Families program will wind down at the end of this month. So where do we go from here?

We know the need is still great. One in nine individuals lives with food insecurities, and the pandemic has brought to light the inequity and inequality that so many experience. When another opportunity arises to serve our neighbors, I know labor will be there to answer to call. That’s who we are! And at the same time we are serving the community, we are informing and educating the community about what our movement stands for – economic security, dignity, good benefits and living wages.

I am grateful to have been a part of this incredible opportunity. Working side by side with so many in the labor movement to bring about significant change in our communities and beyond has been a true blessing.

– Erica Dalager Reed is an AFL-CIO Community Services liaison with the St. Paul Labor Studies & Resource Center, the nonprofit arm of the St. Paul Regional Labor Federation. She wrote this “Labor Voices” column for the June 2021 issue of The Saint Paul Union Advocate.

Filed Under: Labor Voices Tagged With: , , , , , ,

St. Paul unions take on new role getting fresh food to families

February 23, 2021 by

Dave Hallas (L) of United Steelworkers Local 7263 and Tom Edwards, a retired Postal Worker from St. Paul, wave cars through a contactless food distribution event in St. Paul Park, where nearly 200 refinery workers are locked out.

Local unions are stepping up this winter to connect thousands of Minnesotans with free, fresh food available through the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Farmers to Families Food Box program.

The St. Paul Regional Labor Federation, which brings together over 100 local unions in Chisago, Dakota, Ramsey and Washington counties, is spearheading the effort, working in partnership with local unions and labor councils to plan and stage distribution events outside union halls and training centers – and even blocks away from a picket line.

The distribution events are open to all, and with food-shelf visits at an all-time high in Minnesota, they are drawing a lot of interest.

[Find a list of scheduled food events on the Regional Labor Federation’s Facebook page.]

Unions like Local 110 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) are eager to help meet the growing need for food, Business Manager Jamie McNamara said. The union hosted a distribution event at its facility on Conway Street Feb. 20, one of 12 organized by the Regional Labor Federation and its partners last month.

“We’re extremely honored to be able to provide food to the East Side of St. Paul,” McNamara said. “The IBEW has a great partnership with the community here, and we’re very grateful to be of service to a community that’s been so good to us. We look forward to doing another one of these in the future.”

Union volunteers are eager to support food distribution events like this one at IBEW Local 110.

Each distribution site that participates in the Farmers to Families program receives a truckload of around 1,300 food packages. Each package contains 25 to 30 pounds of fresh fruits, vegetables and meat and dairy products, including a gallon of milk.

The events are opportunity to restock the refrigerator, whereas food pantries mostly offer non-perishable, shelf-stable goods.

Erica Dalager Reed, an AFL-CIO Community Services liaison with the Regional Labor Federation, said the fresh food boxes help families struggling with food insecurity to “supplement what they are getting from other resources,” like food shelves.

But offering fresh food comes with unique challenges for Dalager Reed and the federation’s partner organizations.

Timing is everything. When a truck arrives at a distribution site, volunteers must be ready to unload and sort the food for contactless pickup. Distribution must begin – and end – shortly after the food leaves the truck to prevent it from spoiling.

It’s a labor-intensive process, which makes unions uniquely qualified for the job. And through their training centers and industry connections, unions can usually access a pallet jack or forklift to unload the trailer, too.

“When we first hosted a food distribution site at the Labor Center last October, it gave us a real sense of the need that exists in our community,” Regional Labor Federation President Kera Peterson said. “Since then, our affiliate unions and volunteers have given their time and talents generously at event after event, outside and in the cold. I am deeply appreciative.”

The St. Paul Regional Labor Federation and St. Paul Building Trades teamed up for a distribution event at the Labor Center Feb. 3.

The Regional Labor Federation’s nonprofit arm, the St. Paul Labor Studies and Resource Center, plays a key role in accessing the USDA program, which allows only registered nonprofit organizations to arrange for delivery of a Farmers to Families truckload.

The program has been so popular that union groups statewide – and even in North Dakota – have reached out to Dalager Reed about setting up distribution events in partnership with the St. Paul federation and the LSRC.

“We’re just looking to help the community,” Tony Poole, business manager of St. Paul Pipefitters Local 455, said during an event Feb. 16 at the union’s training center in the North End. “We’ve got a lot of low-income families around this neighborhood, and we just want to help. It worked out really well.”

Officers, staff and volunteers from Pipefitters Local 455 pause for a photo during a food distribution event at their North End facility.

It’s gone over well with the public, too.

Dalager Reed said she saw several comments on social media after the Pipefitters’ event, with some users thanking the union and others expressing surprise. One person, she said, wrote: ‘That’s my dad’s union! I didn’t know unions did stuff like that.’”

St. Paul Building Trades Executive Secretary Don Mullin, whose council co-hosted a distribution event Feb. 3 at the St. Paul Labor Center, said that while unions and union members have a long history of giving back to their communities, they aren’t always good at taking credit for it.

“This has been a great opportunity to provide meals to the community, and it really speaks to everything labor does as a whole,” Mullin said. “We help out. We work with the community. And we’re showing the community what we’re all about.”

Filed Under: Community, Politics, Union Events Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Letter carrier walks the (300-mile) walk to fight hunger

July 23, 2014 by
Retired letter carrier Gary Fitch will walk 300 miles in August to raise money for hunger relief.

Retired letter carrier Gary Fitch will walk 300 miles in August to raise money for hunger relief.

On Aug. 2 Gary Fitch, a retired letter carrier from St. Paul, will begin a long walk that he hopes will be a big step toward ending hunger in Minnesota.

Fitch, 62, will walk from International Falls to the State Fairgrounds in Falcon Heights, arriving on Labor Day. The 300-mile journey, dubbed the Minnesota Miracle, will raise money for an endowment to fund anti-hunger initiatives across the state.

It may sound like a lofty goal, but Fitch believes it’s possible if everyone pitches in. And it all starts, he said, with the state’s union members.

“I’m asking them for a penny for every mile I walk,” Fitch said “That’s $3 to watch me bust my butt for 300 miles.

“If we got a penny a mile from 385,000 union members in Minnesota, then we’ve raised a million and a half dollars. It’s just common sense. There’s strength in numbers, and I want to show the strength we have.”

The Minnesota Miracle has received the endorsement of the state’s largest labor federation, the Minnesota AFL-CIO, and regional labor federations in St. Paul and Minneapolis have helped Fitch get his endowment fund off the ground. Already, unions have kicked in $25,000 to jumpstart the Minnesota Miracle.

“The nest has been laid, and we’re adding to it,” Fitch said. “The checks are coming in, and my goal is to raise enough where after this is all said and done, we’ve got at least $300,000 for the endowment. That will give us enough in interest to buy 30,000 to 40,000 pounds of food every year for food shelves in this state.”

Walking the walk

The 300-mile walk across Minnesota will be the latest in a string of long journeys Fitch has taken on to give back to his community, state and country.

In 1989 Fitch rode his bicycle from St. Paul to Washington D.C., carrying nearly 4,000 handwritten letters from children fighting cancer, addressed to President George Bush and First Lady Barbara Bush.

“I wanted to give these kids their own personal mailman,” Fitch said. “Biking out to Washington gave them an assurance, knowing that their letters were going to get there.”

Fifteen years later Fitch embarked on an even more ambitious project. He biked from Seattle to Washington, collecting the “hopes and dreams of 23,651 schoolkids on paper,” he said. Those papers were scanned onto a flash drive, which Fitch presented to NASA.

“NASA took them, put them on the Atlantis shuttle and orbited the earth,” Fitch said. “Those kids put a circle full of hope around the planet.”

Stamping out hunger

Fitch, who walked 12 miles a day as a letter carrier, delivering mail to homes in St. Paul’s Como Park neighborhood, retired in March 2013. He’s fortunate, he said, to have worked in a job that affords him the opportunity to take on an ambitious project like the Minnesota Miracle in his retirement.

“I’ve got my union pension with the post office,” he said. “I had the blessing of being able to retire and do something like this. I represent everybody who wants to, but can’t do something like this because of whatever reason.”

The need for hunger relief is great, even in a “quality-of-life state” like Minnesota.

According to Second Harvest Heartland, the Upper Midwest’s largest hunger relief organization, one of every eight Minnesota children is at risk of hunger issues, and 9.5 percent of Minnesota households are considered “food insecure.”

“I’m hearing about all these kids missing a meal, about elderly people wondering whether they should pay their electric bills or eat,” he said. “It’s time to take care of our own, and if we can do it then every other state in the nation can do it.”

Public support wanted

The Minnesota Miracle walk will launch from International Falls Aug. 2, and unions in the area are helping Fitch organize a kickoff celebration.

Fitch’s next major stop will be Duluth, where his visit will coincide fortuitously with the National Association of Letter Carriers’ annual picnic. Fitch will walk alongside his brothers and sisters from the NALC from the Duluth Labor Temple to the park where the picnic will take place.

“I’m hoping to get a couple hundred people from the unions up there,” Fitch said. “We need to show that labor is stepping up to the plate and making a difference.”

Fitch also has reached out to food shelves across the state, offering the Minnesota Miracle as an opportunity to raise awareness and funds in their communities. The website, minnesotamiracle.com, offers pledge forms communities can use to stage their own “walks against hunger” on days Fitch passes through town.

“I’ve offered myself as a vehicle for any food shelf,” Fitch said. “If people want to come out and walk on behalf of their local food shelf, I’m a vehicle. I’ll usually be walking from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. The rest of the time I’m going to be out soliciting my behind off, wherever I’m at.”

Fitch welcomes company along his journey. A map with his planned route is posted on minnesotamiracle.com, and Fitch will have his phone’s GPS locator turned on, so that anyone wishing to join him can find his location by looking at the website.

“I’ve got stories to tell, and I’m anxious to listen to a lot of them,” he said. “That’s going to be my enjoyment on this thing – meeting the people I meet and making a difference for them, for everybody that wishes they could.

“And when it’s all said and done I’m going fishing.”

Want to give?

Supporters can donate any amount online at minnesotamiracle.com. Second Harvest Heartland is collecting online donations for the Minnesota Miracle through September.

Donors also can mail checks for the Minnesota Miracle to the Minnesota AFL-CIO, 175 Aurora St., St. Paul, MN 55103. All donations to Minnesota Miracle are tax deductible.

Filed Under: Community Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

On Saturday, May 12, help Letter Carriers ‘stamp out hunger’

May 11, 2012 by

Remember to place a bag of non-perishable food items near your mailbox Saturday, May 12, date of the 20th annual “Stamp Out Hunger” food drive, organized nationwide by the National Association of Letter Carriers union.

The food drive is the nation’s largest one-day food drive, and letter carriers throughout the metro area will be participating. The Twin Cities-area goal for this year is to collect more than 1.2 million pounds of food, which will be distributed to local emergency food shelves by Second Harvest Heartland.

Letter carriers will pick up donated food along their routes and bring the donations to local post offices and to waiting trucks at several Cub Foods locations. Volunteers will be needed to help unload letter carrier vehicles and load the larger trucks. For a list of locations, and to volunteer, visit www.2harvest.org.

The Union Advocate will publish photos of Stamp Out Hunger volunteers online and in our print copy. Submit your photos to mmoore [at] stpaulunions [dot] org – and be sure to identify the volunteers and their union locals!

Filed Under: Community Tagged With: , , , , , ,