MENDOTA – After The Mendota Reporter went to press with the March 26 edition featuring a story on the Trump Administration’s program cuts affecting the Mendota Area Christian Food Pantry, the Illinois Department of Human Services sent a notification to lead agencies.

The notification stated the Illinois Equitable Access Towards Sustainable Systems program (Illinois Eats) was reinstated on Thursday, March 20 after it was cut on March 4. The program was shut down for 16 days.

The IDHS also notified it is in partnership with the Illinois Department of Agriculture and the determined funding to reinstate the program is directly coming from the United States Department of Agriculture, which is responsible for establishing the Local Food Purchase Assistance Program, the umbrella for Illinois Eats.

“It was a huge relief for me, the clients, and for the food pantry’s board of directors,” said MACFP Executive Director, Tracy Cooper. “From what I understand, they’re bringing it back under a different funding. It will now be funded by the USDA without federal assistance. This is also a good sign they are not going to take away the USDA program we use for other food purchased for the pantry.

“They’re only bringing Illinois Eats back until the end of the fiscal year, which is actually July 1. We don’t know if it will be done again at the end of June. It depends on whether they find funding or not. So, we’re still up in the air when it comes to June because the program could still end.”

With the Illinois Eats service off the table for those 16 days, Cooper couldn’t get meat from Midwest Food Bank where she used the free program.

Instead, she placed an order on March 11 with River Bend Food Bank, which means the pantry has to pay and the order form looks different from month to month, meaning hamburger may not always be an option.

Usually, the MACFP uses 120 pounds of ground hamburger and ground pork per month to serve its average of 170 families in Mendota and the surrounding area. On the latest order, Cooper ordered 150 pounds (thinking she was buying for the whole month and not knowing if meat would be available on the next order form) at $2.89 per pound.

“I had already looked into getting meat elsewhere and what it was going to cost and how we would go about getting it,” Cooper said. “I had already ordered some meat from USDA that we have to pay for at River Bend. We got our order and now we’ll get Illinois Eats again. I don’t know yet if the program is going to work the same as it did before in terms of us still getting 120 pounds of meat per month.

“I’m still a little bit nervous about it because maybe it’s only here for a few months. This is a little bit of relief, but now we’re tippy toeing around the subject. I’m hoping it’ll be back for good. If it does end again on July 1, at least we have a little bit of time to work with to find meat elsewhere for a reasonable cost. We have time to form a backup plan.

“When Illinois Eats was cut on March 4, I got a notice from the University of Illinois Extension Office at 7 p.m. on that day about the program being eliminated.”

Earlville accounts for one-fourth of the food pantry’s client base. Sharing Hearts, a group based in Earlville, routinely brings in a monthly donation. This month, they brought in two checks with one specifically earmarked for meat.