More county residents using food stamps

The number of people who receive food stamps in Sonoma County continues to grow at a steady rate, yet less than half of the county residents eligible for the federal program are enrolled.

In June, approximately 31,000 county residents received food stamps — or Calfresh as it is now known. That's up from about 25,000 people enrolled last June and more than twice the number of people who were enrolled in the supplemental food program on the eve of the recession in 2008.

Marion Deeds, director of economic assistance for the county human services department, said thousands more are eligible.

"Because of the recession there are a lot of people who would probably be eligible for this program who aren't enrolled," Deeds said.

Advocates said that more than $15 million in federal funds goes unspent in the county because of low enrollment. County officials, community organizations and local health centers are now trying to enroll as many eligible people as possible in Calfresh, a USDA program.

In the past six months, local clinics that are part of the Redwood Community Health Coalition, such as Petaluma Health Center, enrolled 1,000 households in Calfresh. Local health centers have come up with a automatic screening process for Calfresh that kicks in every time someone gets screened for health insurance.

Pedro Toledo, a spokesman for the coalition, said there are thousands of eligible kids in Sonoma County, many of them from Latino families, who are not enrolled. He said that many of these households contain "mixed-status families," which may include a combination of U.S. citizens, legal permanent residents and illegal immigrants.

"Those kids are not getting the assistance that they need for food," he said.

Though Calfresh is primarily aimed at U.S. citizens, some legal immigrants do qualify. These include legal immigrants who either: were admitted into the country for humanitarian reasons; have lived in the country for five years; are receiving disability related assistance or benefits; are children under 18.

Although illegal immigrant adults are not eligible for Calfresh, their U.S. citizen children are. In such cases, the government awards an amount that is proportional to the number of eligible people in a family.

Mary Maddux-Gonzalez, Redwood Community Health Coalition medical officer, said Calfresh can help fill health and nutrition needs of low income residents, many of whom cannot afford a steady diet of fresh and local produce.

"Some of our most significant health problems are directly related to what people eat," said Maddux-Gonzalez.

In the past decade, the cost of healthy foods has steadily increased, while unhealthy foods, high in fat and low in nutritional value, have become more affordable, she said.

"Obesity, iron deficiency, anemia, problems with diabetes, all these are linked to unhealthy eating," she said.

At Community Action Partnership in Santa Rosa, Marlyn Garcia spearheads the county government's efforts to increase enrollment, logging 60 applications a month. Garcia drives to people's homes carrying a portable computer to help people begin the application process.

The Calfresh application can now be submitted online, and the county now allows the required interview with a human services worker to be done by phone.

"Most of the interviews are now done over the phone instead of face-to-face, which is really convenient because people don't have to be waiting for hours at the county office," Garcia said.

Deeds said an average of $52 million in CalFresh funds come into Sonoma County annually. The average monthly benefit for a household, which could be an individual or a family, is $243 a month.

You can reach Staff Writer Martin Espinoza at 521-5213 or martin.espinoza@pressdemocrat.com.