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The San Antonio Food Bank is delivering 30,000 pounds of food to senior citizens today as part of project HOPE — or Healthy Options for the Elderly. It’s part of an ongoing program that started in 2003.
A convoy of San Antonio Food Bank trucks left City Hall directed by Santa Claus on Monday morning.
Project HOPE provides about 40 pounds of food to individual seniors each month who meet specific income levels. The contents of the boxes can be a mix of fresh, non-perishable, and frozen foods.
The program regularly provides food to about 9,000 people per month, according to the city of San Antonio Department of Human Services. On this day, the boxes of food were being delivered to the senior centers managed by the city for distribution.
To participate, a senior must meet federal poverty guidelines such as an income level below $27,000 for one person, or about $36,000 for two people. The amount of donated food changes based on the number of people in the household.
Food Bank CEO Eric Cooper said many seniors find themselves making difficult financial decisions on a daily basis.
"No senior should have to choose between food and taking the medicine they need to live," said Cooper. And so the holidays — it's about cheer. It's about family. It's about love. It's about food culture, tradition. Food brings people to that table, and for many seniors, they don't have those ingredients,” he said.
A project the City of San Antonio will be undertaking this week includes seeing how food insecurity is impacted by federal funding cuts.
“Later on this week, we're going to do a tabletop, and that is designed to help us understand how potential reductions in federal funding, as well as the implementation of the 'One Big, Beautiful Bill,' which will see cuts to Medicare, Medicaid, CHIP and SNAP — what that is going to mean in our community, and how that is going to disproportionately impact our seniors.”
There are an estimated 50,000 seniors in the city who are facing food insecurity.
