State budget cuts put extra burden on nonprofits

Bundled up in winter coats, the people trickling into the Cherry Street Food Bank on a chilly morning for fresh produce and canned goods are diverse: immigrants, military veterans and — increasingly — the recently homeless and the unemployed.

"This is not a regular thing for me," said Pearnell Johnson, who started coming to the food bank last month after he lost his job as a warehouse worker. "For right now, it's just helping me get through hard times and hopefully that will end real soon."

Nonprofits and faith-based organizations have long helped fill the gap between those in need and what the government provides in benefits and social services. But with state lawmakers cutting programs amid a $5.1 billion state budget shortfall, and the impact of the deepest recession in decades still lingering, that gap is widening.

Charitable organizations say they're trying to pick up the slack, but it isn't easy. Coupled with a lagging economy, cuts to government-funded social-service programs mean charitable groups expect to see a new wave of people with even greater needs.

"The need is increasing at a faster rate than the food we can put out," said Shelley Rotondo, executive director of Northwest Harvest, the Seattle-based hunger-relief group that operates the Cherry Street Food Bank. "We can't do it alone."

As the state Legislature rushes to its scheduled April 24 adjournment date, lawmakers in Olympia have proposed budgets that cut state food assistance, care for low-income pregnant women and funding for community health clinics, among other things.

When Gov. Chris Gregoire unveiled her suggested spending cuts last December, she called on individuals and nonprofits to step up and do more.

"State government can't do it anymore," she said. "It's up to the nonprofits, it's up to the faith community, it's up to us."

At the Cherry Street Food Bank, surrounded by cardboard boxes piled with potatoes, apples and bagged lunches, volunteer Gloria Short has seen the number of people looking for help double in the 10 years she's pitched in there.

"People seem to be in greater need and more tense," said Short, a retired college administrator. "I remember someone came in last week and he had finally run out of unemployment benefits."

In addition to the Cherry Street Food Bank, Northwest Harvest provides food to more than 300 other food banks, meal programs and at-risk elementary schools statewide.

Rotondo said that in the past three years, the number of Northwest Harvest food offerings has grown 35 percent to more than 700,000 each month. The demand has risen even as private donations have dropped by about 20 percent in the last fiscal year.

At Seattle's Union Gospel Mission, volunteers have been ramping up their efforts to help the low-income and homeless this past year. The nonprofit, which operates shelters, transitional housing, a dental clinic and other services, raised an additional $1.3 million last year for its annual $14 million program budget.

Among the group's goals for the additional money: increase the number of meals served, launch a new women's shelter in North Seattle, provide mobile legal and dental clinics for the working poor and distribute 100,000 pairs of new socks.

"We were at our capacity, but the issue was there are people out there in desperate need so we had to step in and figure out some way," said Jeff Lilley, the president of Seattle's Union Gospel Mission. "We believe that we've been called by God to do his work and if the needs are going up we're going to have to try harder to meet those needs."

Lilley noted that the charity has been fortunate enough to raise the extra money when many nonprofits are struggling to maintain their existing programs during the economic downturn.

Social worker Kareen Snider, the director of Gethsemane Lutheran Church's community services program, helps low-income and homeless folks 2 1/2 days a week obtain discounted bus passes, sign up for driver's licenses and access government programs such as federal Supplemental Security Income and state Disability Lifeline, along with other services.

This year's funding for the program, mainly from the church's private donations, is expected to total $62,000 — the same as last year. Still, the increase in demand means more people will be turned away.

"We can open five days a week and double or triple the staff and still not keep up with the need," Snider said.

The church's community-services program is already at capacity with about 1,900 appointments a year and an average waiting period of about a month. With more people expected to turn to faith-based and nonprofit organizations for aid, Snider said her church needs all the help it can get.

Snider said that at present funding levels, church-based programs can't accommodate all the need anticipated because of government budget cuts.

"We're already at capacity for what we're funded for, we are already turning people away, and I hope churches that don't have programs will step up," she said.

Queenie Wong: 360-236-8267 or qwong@seattletimes.com