The ongoing U.S. government shutdown is taking a toll on households nationwide, including in the greater Houston area, where businesses are delaying operations due to a lack of government resources. <\/p>\n
In response, the Houston Food Bank held the first of several planned food distribution events at Barnett Stadium on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
Many individuals, some receiving food assistance for the first time, lined up early. Dominique Anderson, a federal worker laid off during the shutdown, expressed her distress. “When I first started working for the FDA, I really thought it was the best career move. That it was going to push me forward professionally, and honestly, this has been devastating. I have a mortgage,” she said.<\/p>\n
Other federal workers, like a Housing and Urban Development employee, shared their fears of job loss if they appeared on camera. “I never thought in a million years I’d be in line to get some food. It’s humiliating. I have been working for 30 years in my career. I had to apply for unemployment I haven’t done that before,” the employee said.<\/p>\n
Wayne Barber, an air traffic controller for 23 years, has worked four overtime shifts since the shutdown began. “I’m still going to show up to work because that’s what I swore an oath to do,” Barber said. <\/p>\n
Despite not receiving pay, he remains committed to his duties. “In the military, you swore the same oath, to defend this country. I work for the people,” he added. <\/p>\n
However, as a father of five, Barber emphasized the need for financial support. “It doesn’t matter, left, right we just want to get paid for what we do,” he said.<\/p>\n
The shutdown’s impact extends to those receiving food stamps, with the U.S. Department of Agriculture announcing the SNAP program will end Saturday. <\/p>\n
Juanita Cavazos, a disabled veteran, urged, “Take care of your people first.” Reflecting on her service, she said, “That’s the saddest thing about it. You know, you go and you give up your life almost, and then to be in these circumstances in the United States, that’s just unforgiving.”<\/p>\n
Houston Food Bank officials report there are approximately 50,000 federal workers in the area and about 425,000 households reliant on food stamps.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The ongoing U.S. government shutdown is taking a toll on households nationwide, including in the greater Houston area,…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":349365,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5130],"tags":[4345,358,3187],"class_list":{"0":"post-349364","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-houston","8":"tag-houston","9":"tag-texas","10":"tag-tx"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115477764361303845","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/349364","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=349364"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/349364\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/349365"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=349364"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=349364"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=349364"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}