Bay Area food banks wrestle with taking California National Guard help

For the Second Harvest of Silicon Valley food bank in Santa Clara County the California National Guard were lifesavers during the early months of the COVID- pandemic commented CEO Leslie Bacho Particular Guard troops filled in for the nonprofit s hundreds of participants who were under stay-at-home orders They packed loaded and distributed meals to people who suddenly discovered themselves out of work or in desperate need of help to feed themselves and their families Nearly six years later Bacho might be inclined to say thanks so much but we ll see to Gov Gavin Newsom s offer to send the state s National Guard troops to food banks again this time to help them cope with a attainable influx of hundreds of thousands of Bay Area residents facing delays in their federal food assistance payments due the federal administration shutdown Unfortunately the timing of Newsom s humanitarian deployment of National Guard members presents complications for food banks as Bacho explained In the past four months the Trump administration has ordered the National Guard to play an increasing role in its widening crackdowns on immigration and violent crime in cities around the United States This timing therefore raises concerns that the presence of federal uniformed troops at food-distribution sites could be scary for certain low-income populations Just in this moment there s a lot of fear and concern in the region Bacho declared We would be having folks who are associated with law enforcement at sites who might scare people away she commented with evident regret given her regard for National Guard efforts in March Bacho revealed she could see National Guard troops helping out in their warehouses though the food bank right now has enough assistants at those locations Similarly Caitlyn Sly CEO of the Food Bank of Contra Costa and Solano disclosed they don t have a need for National Guard help right now and tend to have plenty of helpers during the holiday season But the situation could change in the coming weeks if the shutdown continues Slay noted There are selected households in their two-county operation area that won t be getting payments from CalFresh California s version of the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Plan SNAP We re grateful for the offer she stated If we end up needing it we will call upon it But like Bacho Sly stated her food bank would be wary about having federal troops in any public-facing role at this present time and would instead have them work at their two warehouses in Concord and Fairfield There is so much chaos and confusion going on for low-income individuals and people experiencing hunger especially among our immigrant populations Sly reported Their clients also could confuse National Guard members with Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers she revealed We wouldn t want to unnecessarily scare or deter people from feeling safe to come get food from us Thus far both the San Francisco-Marin Food Bank and the Alameda County Food Bank have declined offers of California National Guard help according to NBC BayArea It s not not clear if these food banks have enough staff and supporters to distribute food or if they had concerns about the presence of uniformed troops at their work sites Executives at these food banks were not available to comment over the weekend As the federal regime shutdown drags into its fourth week Newsom s office declared that it was deploying National Guard troops to food banks and fast-tracking up to million in state funding for these organizations Several million CalFresh recipients have begun to experience delays in their November food benefits his office reported As SNAP delays hit dinner tables right before the holiday season the state is working hard to keep families from going hungry Newsom revealed in a announcement Friday The first deployment of California National Guard troops began Friday at the Los Angeles Regional Food Bank where they helped civilian supporters sort and package pounds of fresh produce As a local TV news station stated these troops helped give back to the locality just months after various of their colleagues were dispatched to Los Angeles to hold back crowds protesting immigration raids In current times the California Military Department is on the ground supporting food bank operations in Los Angeles Major General Matthew P Beevers the department s Adjutant General revealed in a comment We are grateful to play a crucial role in this effort and honored to serve our communities once again But as if anticipating the concerns of food bank executives like Bacho and Sly Newsom s office noted that Guard members would work behind the scenes at warehouses where they could be put to work packing boxes managing deliveries and otherwise moving supplies to keep food flowing to people in need Under the governor s command and at the direction of the state s Department of Social Services troops won t interact directly with the citizens and they will not conduct any immigration questions or enforcement Even with the troops having orders to not conduct enforcement operations Bacho expects that a few of their clients will still want to avoid going anywhere near them And as Second Harvest remains open to welcoming National Guard help in the future we want to reassure folks that we won t have a National Guard presence at our distribution sites because we don t want people to be afraid to reach out for help