May 2025 Newsletter:
Saving What We Love
As befits the Executive Director of a food pantry like Toco Hills Community Alliance, one of my favorite songs is “Crowded Table” by The Highwomen. I especially love the line in the lyrics that says, “I want a house with a crowded table/And a place by the fire for everyone.”
As supporters of THCA, I know that you love tables, too:
the picnic table at THCA where our unhoused friends eat together;
the lunch table of diverse THCA volunteers eating before serving;
the tables of your organizations that you have shared with me;
the kitchen tables of THCA neighbors, with bellies filled, spirits lifted.
With your help, we are bringing what we love to life, we are making real the ideal that everyone has food – and hope – and we are building community. I am so very inspired by how our community responds and shows support to our neighbors time after time. Together, with your help, we are making a positive impact in our neighborhood and in our world.
Sadly, though, the dream of a crowded table where everyone has what they need and that we are all in it together is endangered.
Even now, the House of Representatives is in Washington, DC, working on the federal budget reconciliation legislation that greatly decreases much-needed resources to those who need it most. Of particular concern to those of us who love the crowded table is the very deep cuts to SNAP and to Medicaid. If you remember, last month, I said we would share more details as they became available; the details are frankly frightening.
The bill would reduce funding for SNAP, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (what used to be Food Stamps), by $300 million dollars over the next 10 years. Under this plan, over 400,000 Georgians, more than 25% of current SNAP recipients, are at risk of losing SNAP assistance that helps them to feed their families.
If passed, this plan would gut one of the largest food security programs in the country and leave millions of families with much emptier tables. The bill also includes cuts that would leave at least 7.6 million low-income people nationwide uninsured due to changes in Medicaid.
To be clear, though, low-income families are not the only ones that would be hurt by these draconian cuts. Every $1 of SNAP benefits generates about $1.75 of economic activity because SNAP benefits are spent at local stores, boosting local economies. Without SNAP, stores will close, jobs will be lost, farmers will be hurt, and whole communities devastated.
For more information on the effects of SNAP cuts, see link here.
As for THCA, we have been as honest and transparent as we can be about what is already happening here:
- record numbers of people coming for service
- challenges in accessing the kind and amount of food we need
- the cost of food doubling for us in the last two months
THCA will, of course, always attempt to stand and fill the gaps.
However, if these SNAP cuts are enacted, though, there is no way the emergency food network will be able to meet the demand for food assistance that would arise. It would be way beyond what nonprofits and faith communities would be able to provide for.
For those who love the crowded table, who believe that we can feed and care for everyone, can make room for everyone, we CAN DO something. Before the whole House votes on Thursday, May 22, we can contact our Representatives to let them know how devastating these cuts would be.
This link will take you to an email template from Feeding America where you will enter your name and address (to identify your Congressional District) and the email will automatically be sent to your Representative.
You may never have contacted your Representative, but it is your right to do so, for even if you didn’t vote for them, their job is to represent you, to listen to all of their constituents.
You may be hesitant because you don’t think of yourself as political; this issue, though, is not about political party, but about the political willpower to make our moral imagination realized. This is not about left and right, this is about who will be left behind, and about life and death, really.
And, for some, an email may not seem enough. If you know your Congressional Representative, you may call (202) 224-3121 for the U.S. House switchboard operator and talk to a staff in their office.
There are at least two more ways you can help:
Donate funds to THCA to help us keep up our work to share food and hope with our neighbors, to continue making a positive impact for:
- the single parents
- the senior citizens
- the students
And so many more that we serve…
Donate specific items needed at THCA. Last month, we asked our faith communities and other organization to donate 700 of some specific food items we have not been able to purchase. We have 7 churches who joined! Thank you SO MUCH to all of them. And there are still some needed items.
Working together, making our voices heard together, we can save what we love – tables crowded with people and food and hope and compassion.
Grateful to be in this together with you all,
Rev. Dr. Lisa Heilig,
Executive Director
We are so grateful that we have been able to have graduate interns during the school year. We have grown attached to them, but alas, summer is upon us now.
Even though we do have high school interns for a few hours a day for the month of May and graduate students doing their practicum with us, we do find ourselves in need of a few more volunteers as the summer comes.
This is a great summer opportunity for any college or even high school students. Volunteers must be at least 14, be able to stand long periods of time, lift 25 pounds, and withstand varying weather conditions. Click below for info.
Mobile Food Pantries
As part of our long-range plan, we have been getting out of our building and traveling to approved sites for Mobile Food Pantries.
On May 3rd, we were once again at Second Ponce de Leon Baptist Church. Despite a little drizzle, some 25-30 volunteers packed up and shared 10,000 pounds of fresh vegetables with 250 families.
This past weekend, on May 17th, we returned to Laurel Ridge Elementary School for the last time this school year. With about 15 Laurel Ridge volunteers and about 15 THCA volunteers, we were able to share about 9,000 pounds of food with about 100 families. The rain held off, but it was very humid!
And, this Friday the 23rd, in the morning, we are excited to be at a new site at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Atlanta.
We are grateful for all of our community partners; together, we are practicing hospitality without borders.
Copyright © 2025 Toco Hills Community Alliance, All rights reserved.
Our physical address is:
1790 Lavista Road
Atlanta, GA 30329
Our mailing address is:
2897 North Druid Hills Rd., #115
Atlanta, GA 30329
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