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Bellingham Food Bank has ‘unprecedented need,’ not enough funds

Director asking for additional $1M from county

Food Bank Executive Director Mike Cohen standing behind plastic film meant to cover the crates of vegetables in front of him.
Food Bank Executive Director Mike Cohen is seeking federal pandemic relief funds from the Bellingham and Whatcom County councils to partially make up a $1.7 million budget shortfall. (Hailey Hoffman/Cascadia Daily News)
By Nina Walsh News Intern

Bellingham Food Bank Executive Director Mike Cohen appealed to the Whatcom County Council on March 21 for an additional $1 million in funding for both 2023 and 2024, as inflation and demand increase.

At a Committee of the Whole meeting, a motion to take funds from the Healthy Children’s Fund failed to pass, 5-2. Multiple county council members instead expressed support for using uncommitted American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds to meet the $1 million request.

The Bellingham Food Bank has already received an additional $500,000 in ARPA funds from the county council for 2023, but Cohen predicts more will be needed to sufficiently provide for the community.

The food bank also receives $138,000 in discretionary funds from the county on a yearly basis, which Cohen said has not increased in about a decade.

“The half-million dollars we got from the county … is one of the only reasons we have as much food on our shelves and in our freezers and coolers as we do have,” Cohen told the county council. “[But] it’s simply not enough.”  

Cohen also told the council that food bank shelves and fridges are currently “pretty bare,” and the food bank is “desperately falling short” in what it can provide to recipients.  

Between 15% and 20% of Whatcom County residents visit a food bank each week, and visits have increased from 40,000 per month to nearly 90,000 since January 2022, Cohen said. 

Cohen, who has worked for the Bellingham Food Bank since 2004, said the current level of need is unprecedented — even in comparison to the 2008 recession and the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.  

After temporary additional Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits ended in March, Cohen predicts the need will continue to rise — with the average Washington SNAP recipient losing $80 a month in benefits.


“I am desperately nervous about what food bank families will experience when they visit a food bank in the near future and next year, because I don’t think the need is going to go down,” Cohen told Cascadia Daily News.

Cohen plans to continue collaborations with both the county council and Bellingham City Council to find sustainable investments and food security solutions for the community. 

“I was encouraged and I am hopeful to hear the majority of the council …  saying they wanted to find that $1 million for the food bank network,” Cohen said. “It’s just going to be continued work with the administration and the county council to turn that expression of wanting to do it into actually doing it.”

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