CoMoHelps continues relief efforts as requests for emergency assistance top $113,000
Mitchell Kaminski
COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)
With the federal government shutdown over and SNAP benefits restored, local nonprofits say the demand for emergency assistance remains, and CoMoHelps will continue taking requests for at least another week.
The collaborative relief fund — relaunched in October as SNAP benefits were halted — has now allocated nearly $60,000 to 11 agencies, according to emails from Boone County Commissioner Kip Kendrick. Kendrick said the fund — supported by the Veterans United Foundation, United Way, and the Community Foundation of Central Missouri — raised an additional $23,000 in community donations.
CoMoHelps leaders say the need has expanded beyond food. Shutdown-related uncertainty pushed many families into difficult choices about basic expenses.
“We intentionally tried to make sure that we were very thoughtful about the money that was given for the requests that were coming in,” Heart of Missouri United Way President and CEO Talia Jackson said.”What we saw early on is that organizations were maybe trying to look at what they were going to need between the time of the shutdown, all the way until the end of the year or beyond, and we wanted to take a conservative approach, not knowing how much fundraising we were going to be able to bring in.”
Jackson added requests have continued even after the shutdown ended. In all, organizations submitted close to $113,000 in requests, which went far beyond food assistance. Some agencies sought help to stock diapers at daycare centers or cover tuition for parents who couldn’t afford it, while others requested gas cards for families struggling to get to work.
“People were having to make decisions. ‘Do I put gas in my car or do I go get food?’ And sometimes you might have to prioritize getting gas so that you can get to the job and have money to be able to still have some food on the table,” Jackson explained. “We saw things like gas, rent, and utility requests. We saw child care diapers. So it was a lot of the what we’re calling basic needs on top of just food.”
The Columbia Housing Authority was among the agencies that applied for assistance. Chief Executive Officer Randy Cole told ABC 17 News the Columbia Housing Authority received $2,500 to support on-site food access at Paquin Tower and Oak Towers. The funding will help provide food for roughly 200 households at Paquin and another 146 residents at Oak Towers.
“We get direct engagement and feedback from 30-to-40 residents on a monthly basis and food access comes up often as a topic of concern,” Cole said. “With the SNAP benefits having some uncertainty, some of our residents as well as our staff, saw that as a need. And so we want to make sure we have a really good amount of food access onsite, knowing that there’s colder winter months coming too, so it might be harder for some of our elderly disabled population to get out.”
Cole said the CHA has received notice of its award and is still waiting on final paperwork, but expects the funding to arrive soon. The agency plans to spend a portion of the money each month over the next two to three months to help stretch the support through the winter.
“We’re an organization with a lot of needs that serves a lot of residents. So we’re going to continue to look for resources for a variety of needs, including additional rent assistance or other basic needs that our residents might need help with, additional food security, all types of things that we can help our residents maintain that stability,” Cole said.
CoMoHelps is continuing to monitor requests and feedback they are receiving through at least November. Since not all the initial requests were fully funded, Kendrick says the group may go back to the nonprofits that were only partially funded to see if they still have additional needs.
“We’re just going to kind of allow the community to tell us what is needed in terms of how long we need to keep it open. But if those requests dry up and we still have dollars in the hopper, we haven’t quite decided how we’re going to deal with that,” Jackson said. “The beauty about the collaborative effort that these five organizations came together and did is that we meet all the time. We’re always having conversations.”
Even before the shutdown, food insecurity was already a significant issue in Boone County. More than 15,000 residents rely on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, and more than 15% report experiencing food insecurity, according to county officials.
“Our residents feel the community support,” Cole said. “Columbia is a great town with a lot of people that care about our most vulnerable populations, and people feel that at the ground level and we regularly hear a lot of positive feedback from our residents.”