Food Insecurity in Hamilton County

• If you have to make the decision between paying bills or buying food, you are food insecure.
• Very few people suffer from hunger or starvation. What there is a lack of is adequate nutrition.
• If you are food insecure, your cognitive abilities is similar to that of watching Netflix on a dial-up modem.
• Food insecurity is the state of being without reliable access to sufficient quantity of affordable, nutritious food. Read the official USDA definition here.
• Hamilton County has the lowest food insecurity rate in the state at 8.8% (according to 2016 findings). However, due to the population of Hamilton County, that still means more than 26,000 people in the county are food insecure.
• To meet the needs of those who are food insecure in Hamilton County, we still need over $15 million a year.
• 59% of food insecure people in Hamilton County do not qualify for SNAP benefits. This is the highest in the county. The suspect to this is the high cost of living in Hamilton County.