As price hikes stick, signs of food insecurity mount in Sioux Falls area

Kayla has been in line for the Feeding South Dakota mobile food distribution for 45 minutes or longer — she can’t remember. The burning hot 5 p.m. sun beats down on her small, dented car. The little boy in the backseat starts to fuss.

Blonde and tired, she looks barely old enough to be an adult herself. She said she’s employed at a local nonprofit, but she’s behind on bills, and they need food.

“We just need a little extra to get by right now. … We came here a few months ago too. Everyone was really helpful,” she said. “Just being able to eat and feed my kids and get by (is the goal right now).”

Of the 194 families in line for the Feeding South Dakota mobile food distribution this day, most of the adults behind the wheel are either young parents or seniors with a lot of kids counting on them.

Claude sits behind the wheel next to his teenage grandson. He said they’ve been to the distribution sites more than 10 times in the past two years. Claude said they have more people at home to feed too.

An elderly couple said they’ve been out here multiple times. “We have a lot of medical bills to pay, and we need to eat too.”

In its most recent fiscal year, Feeding South Dakota distributed 15.5 million meals to families across the state. The nonprofit food bank organization that fights hunger in all 66 counties of the state has 11 refrigerated food distribution trucks in Sioux Falls. 

“We’ve seen a 20 percent increase in the last twelve months,” said Stacey Andernacht, marketing and communications director.

“We’re feeding 12,000 families each month (across South Dakota). But it’s been over 13,000 the last couple of months. We think a lot of that is inflation and the pandemic era — with benefits and programs coming to an end.”

Once a month, South Dakotans facing food insecurity can receive grocery boxes packed with nutritious foods. Examples of these food items include fresh or frozen produce, meat, shelf-stable items, dairy products and boxed meals.

Jose, a young man in line to bring home food for his parents, said they have six more kids at home and often feed other family members who stop by.

An elderly woman said she’d been in line for over an hour but needed the food.

“Kids need food. We need food. There’s seven kids at home waiting on me.”

Multiple other families with young children in tow wait in their cars for the food distribution to begin. Even before cars start going through the line, there are over 50 cars waiting.

Food-insecure families cannot afford fresh produce items, and Feeding South Dakota makes sure to provide produce, meat and dairy products, Andernacht said.

The USDA’s Emergency Food Assistance Program donates food, and other local donations also source food. Partners of Feeding South Dakota set up drive thru-style sites for distribution.

Volunteers then load the food into the vehicles of those using the program.

Any person in need of food assistance may receive food from the mobile food distribution site at no cost to them. However, to receive the specific USDA food items made available through the Emergency Food Assistance Program, individuals must be residents of South Dakota and fall within income guidelines.

Andernacht said Feeding South Dakota sees many dual-income families using the mobile food distribution program.

“The drive-thru aspect became popular during COVID. Many agency partners closed, yet people still needed food,” Andernacht said. “This became an efficient way to get food into communities.”

According to Andernacht, there has been a rise in the demand for food in terms of weight. As a result of food shortages caused by COVID-19, Feeding South Dakota had to modify the amount of food distributed. Previously, it provided 70 to 75 pounds of food per family, but now it is giving around 55 pounds.

Banquet visits up

Summer typically is a busy time for The Banquet, and this one is no exception.

In July, the number of people served at dinner averaged 350 guests downtown, with 250 at breakfast. On the west side, it was 200 at dinner, with nearly half children.

“Anyone who is hungry can come and eat with us,” said Andrew Hewitt, director of marketing and development. “We have a wide variety of people at our two locations. We often see more of our homeless population downtown, while the west location has taken over as our primary spot for families and people who are food insecure.”

The summer upticks are driven in part by kids lacking access to food at school, he said.

“During different points in the month/seasons, we see how society security income fluxes the needs too,” he added.

“I would say that at our downtown location we are fairly consistent year over year in how many we are serving. A different story is how our west location has slowly been building in number of meals served. We  have seen a slow yet steady increase at that location as people become more aware of our service offerings on that side of town.”

Both Feeding South Dakota and The Banquet have backpack programs, but each supports different aspects of living. Feeding South Dakota provides backpacks of nonperishable food items for children to take home over the weekends during both the school year and summer.

Last year, Feeding South Dakota distributed 3,422 backpacks of food to children each week. 

The Banquet provides school supplies to anyone during the back-to-school season.

“There are people without basic needs in our city that could desperately use our resources,” Hewitt said, adding it’s oversimplifying to think that food-insecure people have made bad choices or are otherwise to blame for their situation.

“There’s really just a scary amount of bad luck for people out there.”