Maine Rep. Chellie Pingree has invited the President of Good Shepherd Food Bank, Heather Paquette to join her at tonight's State of the Union address.
Paquette said food insecurity in Maine is back to pre-pandemic levels.
"Mainers are experiencing difficulty making choices with their resources," Paquette said. "And you can't trade off things like rent, or your power bill, very easily. So, people make a sacrifice and they choose to trade off food."
Pingree says Congress is moving to increase funding for food aid programs like WIC, the program that supplies women, infants and children, supplemental food, health care referrals, and nutrition education. A congressional committee has also approved more money for SNAP, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. But Pingree complains that winning that extra funding is always harder than it should be.
"In the years I've been in Congress, I've never been able to fathom why is it we fight about making sure people have enough food," Pingree said. "There's plenty of other things we can argue about, but food should be basic."
