Day 1.

Today is the first day of our Larimer County SNAP Challenge.  Since we don't have too much to report yet, I wanted to give you some background on a few of our challenge participants and share their responses to the pre-challenge questions.

Lauren Dewey

My name is Lauren Ross Dewey and I am thirty years old.  I work as the Development Manager at the Food Bank for Larimer County.  I will be participating in the Challenge with my husband, Keith, who is a veteran attending CSU on the GI Bill.  When we moved to Fort Collins three years ago, nutrition and organic, local food became a higher priority in our lives.  It was part of the culture in Washington, D.C. to eat several of our meals at happy hour and that is what we did.  Now we have a vegetable garden, minimize the amount of processed food we eat and only buy organic, cage free meat and eggs.  Our weekly grocery budget is about $80 and we eat about one meal out a weekend.  I wanted to participate in the SNAP Challenge in hopes that my passion for policy and politics will inspire members of my community to be a voice for Food Bank clients and other Larimer County residents who rely on the federal nutrition safety net.  

Amy Pezzani

·         My name is Amy Pezzani and I am the Executive Director of the Food Bank for Larimer County and will be participating in the SNAP Challenge with my family.

    How high of a priority is nutrition to you and your family? Extremely high.

     How often do you eat out? For me, eating out includes getting a sandwich at Subway for lunch or going out to dinner.  Lately, I’ve been bringing my lunch almost every day but I’d say we still average eating out 2 times/meals per week at least. 

    What do you think will be the hardest part of this challenge? In college and directly after college, I struggled financially.  I worked nearly FT while going to college and still had a very difficult time making ends meet making around $4.25/hr.  I still remember the day to day stress of having so little money that just about anything could become a major catastrophe.  Although I have more financial freedom now, I still remember that feeling and appreciate being able to stop at the store and buy what I want when I want.  It is a luxury I don’t take for granted.  That will probably be the hardest part for me…not being able to buy what I want when I want.

     John Kefalas and Beth Helmers

       My name is John Kefalas and I am 58 years old.  I am the State Senator for the City of Fort Collins (SD-14).  I will be participating in the SNAP Challenge with my wife, Beth, who works at Redeemer Lutheran Church in Fort Collins.  Our reason for participating in the SNAP Challenge is to raise awareness about hunger and food insecurity in our community and to encourage action towards solutions.  We wish to personally experience, to a small extent, the personal challenges that families face trying to make ends meet while on food stamps.  We do not make a lot of money but as empty nesters with little debt and a great vegetable garden, we are blessed with many options and luxuries that many families do not have.  This week will require us to make serious lifestyle adjustments and that is good.  As a policy maker and chair of the Economic Opportunity Poverty Reduction Task Force, this experience will inform my decision making.

      (Answered by Beth)

          What is your normal weekly food budget? Our normal weekly food budget for the two of us -- I'd guess -would be about twice what SNAP recipients get, about $130. That is one of the reasons I've wanted to do this challenge, since I believe we are extravagant in our food spending.

  How high of a priority is nutrition to you and your family? Nutrition is a high priority. We also value supporting fair trade produce, and organic and local farmers. I always try to buy "free-range" eggs.

       How often do you eat out? We eat out perhaps once a week, but John often meets with folks over coffee at a local shop and I often grab a deli salad or sandwich for lunch on my way to work.

      What do you think will be the hardest part of this challenge? For John, it will be perhaps his crazy schedule and figuring out when he can eat our prepared meals.  He has reception events and luncheon meetings at which he will have to forgo eating, and back-to-back other meetings that mean lunch may be quite late in the afternoon.  I am a bit concerned, since he is on a marathon-training schedule, too. For me, the hardest part I think will be avoiding all the food and goodies that are usually present at work. 

     Lauren Mingus

       My name is Lauren Mingus and I am 41 years old. I am the Communications Manager at the Food Bank for Larimer County. I will be participating in the 5-day SNAP Challenge. For several years my family and I have made healthy eating a priority. As I’ve learned more about the links between health, nutrition and learning, I believe that it is important for my family, particularly my three growing boys, to eat a healthy diet that includes fresh produce, whole grains and antibiotic/hormone free meats and dairy. A good percentage of the food we purchase is organic. Based on our beliefs and commitment to healthy eating, our weekly food budget is nearly three times that of the average SNAP allowance. We’ve made this a budget priority, choosing to spend less in other areas. I recognize that many families do not have the luxury of choice. My goal this week is to eat as healthy as possible, but recognize that I will have to make difficult choices; choices I am not used to making, but I know that millions of Americans face every day. 

      Olivia Brown Fisher

       My name is Olivia Brown Fisher. I'll be participating in the SNAP challenge along with my husband, Chad. We're both in our thirties, have no kids (yet) and work for Poudre School District. I work full time as a Family Mentor for Head Start and Chad works part time as the Violin/Mandolin Program Coordinator at Laurel Elementary School. He also teaches 40 private students through his Lineage Music Project. Our income puts us at about 250% of the federal poverty level, which is considered low income based on Larimer county's median income but disqualifies us for most forms of assistance like SNAP. ( http://www.larimer.org/compass/median_family_income_ec_ind.htm#chart1)  We both feel fortunate to work in jobs that we feel passionately about, and enjoy a great quality of life, even if our income is considered low. Many of the families I work with rely on SNAP and the food bank to feed their children. I hope this experience can give me some insight into their struggles.

      Our normal food budget is about $150 a week, partly because our busy lives mean eating out frequently and partly because we try to buy mostly organic, locally-produced food for health and environmental reasons. I usually do all the cooking and only eat out once or twice a week but Chad eats lunch out more often than not. The SNAP challenge will mean we have $45 for the two of us to eat for 5 days ($4.50/day times 2 people times 5 days). We have agreed to forego eating out during this time. I sat down today and made a menu of some of our regular meals plus snacks. My total food costs for the five days was over $70, so I had to cut about a third of my budget right off the top. I eliminated several "luxuries" like jam, granola bars and my favorite snack, chips & salsa. The only thing I could not cut is my favorite fair trade, organic coffee. It is the one beverage besides water that we cannot do without. I think the most challenging thing this week will be to stick to the menu, even when I have other food in my house (from previous shopping trips). I will have to remind myself that having a pantry full of organic food is a privilege not everyone in my community can afford.

    Megan Ehrlich

      My Name is Megan Ehrlich and I am twenty-three years old. I am the Registered Dietitian at the Food Bank for Larimer County. I will be participating in the SNAP Challenge in an effort to help raise awareness about the challenges of maintaining a balanced diet on such a tight budget. We know that poverty and obesity often coexist, and it is my goal to help better understand the day to day challenges that someone who is relying on SNAP benefits faces. Can $4.50 a day provide enough food to meet the USDA recommended 3 servings of dairy, 2 cups of fruit, 2 ½ cups of vegetables, 6oz grain, and 5 ½ oz. of protein PER DAY?  During the SNAP challenge I hope to find out how feasible those guidelines are for such limited resources, and what other obstacles prevent optimal health along the way.  

     What is your normal weekly food budget? My Husband and I’s normal weekly budget is about $100-$120 for groceries and other household items, which are usually purchased together. If I was to guess, about $80 is spent on food each week.

     How high of a priority is nutrition to you and your family? Absolutely a priority. As a Registered Dietitian I can’t help but bring my work home and try to provide healthy meals and snacks for myself and my husband (with some room for less healthy items in moderation)

     How often do you eat out? My husband and I have dinner out usually once a week, and usually lunch out one day per weekend.

     What do you think will be the hardest part of this challenge? I think the hardest part will be the time intensity of preparing healthy foods. It is one thing to buy the least expensive items (i.e. dried beans), but then there is a whole process to the preparation. I think variety will be an issue also because $4.50 a day does not allow one to purchase a wide variety of foods. For example, to save money I think I will end up eating the same type of breakfast each day, which is not very reasonable to think someone would do that for an extended period of time past five days.  

     Adam Wiemold

    My normal weekly food budget for groceries is around $50 per week.

    Nutrition is not a thing I think about at all. I’m a horrible person. I just eat what tastes good. Sometimes I’ll eat healthy food, but really, I don’t sit and wonder if I’ve had enough fiber, enough fruit or veggies. I RARELY eat breakfast. Probably haven’t had breakfast regularly since I was 12.  

      I probably eat out three times a week. I cook for a living, and I live alone, sometimes the last thing I want to do when I get home is cook food on my days off. So, probably one night during the week and once on Saturday and Sunday.

      The first that is going to be tough for me is purchasing. I can find great deals on food, but they are always in a bulk pack, $9.00 for 3lbs of thin cut sirloin steak will last me two or three weeks if I use it for different meals. Butter, I can’t buy a single stick of butter, I can’t afford to buy 4 sticks for a week challenge. That one has me really frustrated. Im going to miss milk. I drink so much milk, its unnatural, a gallon every 2 or 3 days. Again at $3.00 a gallon it’s the one food I am going to have to give up for 5 days. At  4,384 calories though it’s probably not the worst thing in the world.