As Congress weighs deep cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, a Lansing nonprofit is working to improve access to healthy, affordable food in underserved neighborhoods.
NorthWest Initiative is launching a new effort to connect local organizations with corner markets in northwest Lansing, aiming to bring better food options to residents who often lack access to fresh and nutritious items.
Karrie Dunn, program manager at NorthWest Initiative, said northwest Lansing was considered a food desert until just a few years ago. And while the opening of Capital City Market downtown in 2020 helped, she said the store’s prices often exclude the very residents her group aims to serve.
That’s why her team is encouraging retailers to make small, incremental changes.
“It’s not my expectation that they’re gonna put in, you know, 12 feet of cold storage … but turning over one or two of their facings in their frozen section from frozen burritos or frozen pizzas to frozen vegetables, frozen fruits … it’ll be different for every store,” Dunn said.
The program is now at risk as federal lawmakers debate President Trump’s budget bill which includes a proposed elimination of SNAP-Ed, the nutrition education and outreach component of SNAP.
“A complete and total cut of SNAP-Ed is included in the bill that’s currently in Congress. So, that will eliminate the position that I’m in, and it will eliminate this initiative,” Dunn said.
“We do work beyond this as well. We do nutrition education in the schools and with older adults in senior housing apartment complexes. We do cooking classes with families and individuals here at our office as well as at community centers. All of that work will go away.”
About 1.4 million Michiganders — roughly 15% of the state’s population — rely on SNAP benefits. If passed, the proposed changes could force many to rely more heavily on food pantries and other strained community resources.
Despite the uncertainty, NorthWest Initiative is pressing ahead with its plan to work directly with neighborhood stores to make healthy food more accessible.