Maine’s Food Pantries Face Volunteer Shortage and Looming Budget Cuts: A Growing Crisis

In the small town of Winterport, Maine, Phylis Allen dedicates her days to hunting down affordable groceries. She scours Sam’s Club for potatoes, checks Walmart and local markets for budget-friendly beets and ginger, and monitors weekly stock updates from Good Shepherd, the state’s sole food-insecurity-survey/” title=”USDA Halts Crucial Survey Monitoring … Among Americans: What This Means for the Nation”>food bank, to find deals on staples like butter and cheese.

Each Monday morning, Allen visits three different stores, mentally tracking prices and recalling the specific needs of the families she serves. On a recent trip to Sam’s Club, she located reasonably priced eggs in a large refrigerated section. Reaching up, she grabbed two hefty boxes, each containing seven dozen eggs priced at $21 per box. “That’s about $2.82 per dozen,” she noted. “A solid deal for eggs.”

These eggs were destined for Neighbor’s Cupboard, the local food pantry Allen has helped manage for 17 years. Every Wednesday, she and a dedicated team of volunteers distribute generous food packages to 25 to 30 families in need.

Maine consistently ranks among New England’s states with the highest rates of food insecurity. Pantry leaders report that the challenge of feeding their communities is intensifying due to shrinking food donations, rising demand, and a heavy dependence on volunteers-many of whom are retirees well into their 80s.

In rural Waldo County, where Neighbor’s Cupboard operates, approximately one in seven residents faced food insecurity in 2023, mirroring state and national averages, according to an analysis of U.S. Census Bureau and Feeding America data by the Associated Press.

In a controversial move, the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced on September 20 that it will cease publishing food insecurity data after October, citing concerns that the statistics had become “overly politicized.”

Downtown Winterport, Maine, as seen on August 26, 2025.
Katherine Emery/AP/The Maine Monitor

Federal Funding Cuts Impact Food Assistance Programs

Earlier this year, the Trump administration slashed over $1 billion from two critical USDA initiatives: the Emergency Food Assistance Program, which supplies free food to food banks nationwide, and the Local Food Purchase Assistance Cooperative Agreement Program, which funds state and tribal governments to buy local farm products for hunger relief groups.

“I see federal food supplies dwindling month after month,” Allen remarked.

Additionally, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), commonly known as food stamps, faces proposed reductions totaling $186 billion. Feeding America anticipates that these cuts will increase reliance on food pantries.

Maine’s network of nearly 600 hunger relief organizations-including 250 food pantries, soup kitchens, senior centers, shelters, schools, and youth programs-depends heavily on volunteers to distribute donated and low-cost food from Good Shepherd Food Bank.

More than three-quarters of these groups operate entirely with volunteer labor, without any paid employees, according to Good Shepherd.

Anna Korsen, co-chair of the Ending Hunger in Maine advisory committee, emphasizes that volunteer-run food pantries alone cannot eradicate hunger.

“If we truly want to end hunger in Maine, relying solely on a volunteer-driven charitable food system won’t suffice,” Korsen explained. “These pantries are meant for emergency relief, but they’ve become a permanent fixture in the food landscape-and that’s not how it should be.”

On a recent Wednesday morning, Neighbor’s Cupboard buzzed with activity: towering stacks of canned goods and children’s artwork decorating the cooler.

Keith Ritchie, 89, welcomed visitors while discreetly ensuring no one took more than their share of limited supplies. Betty Williams, 88, another longtime volunteer, playfully teased him about their ages.

Ritchie, who has volunteered for over 17 years, shared, “I’ve only missed two days in all that time.” He travels 20 miles each way to distribute groceries and fill bags with surprise treats like donated Girl Scout cookies.

“I recognize many faces,” he said. “Names aren’t necessary; the faces tell the story.”

The Challenge of an Aging Volunteer Base

Finding younger volunteers is proving more difficult than locating affordable eggs. While about 35% of Mainers volunteer-ranking third highest nationally-only 20% of millennials participate, half the rate of Generation X and baby boomers, according to a 2024 report on Maine’s civic engagement.

Researcher Quixada Mozre-Vissing, a co-author of the report, attributes this not to a lack of willingness but to societal pressures.

“People today are overwhelmed and stretched thin,” Mozre-Vissing explained. “Rising living expenses, especially housing costs, force many to work longer hours.”

Many younger volunteers prefer “event-based” opportunities-one-time commitments without ongoing obligations. A 2023 AmeriCorps survey found that about 20% of volunteers engage through a combination of online and in-person activities.

This shift toward sporadic volunteering creates operational challenges.

Julie Greene, volunteer engagement director at Second Harvest Heartland in Minnesota, recounted how the food bank had to reject thousands of pounds of food in early September due to insufficient volunteers to sort and package donations.

Consequently, food pantries across Minnesota and western Wisconsin faced shortages.

Greene is working to reconcile the need for consistent, hands-on volunteer labor with the growing preference for occasional service.

“We’re exploring how to offer more one-time volunteer events to attract people while still meeting our operational needs,” she said.

At Neighbor’s Cupboard, Allen identifies volunteer retention-not funding cuts-as the biggest hurdle.

“As volunteers age, health issues arise, or family needs take precedence,” she said.

Food distribution demands physical strength and reliability-volunteers must often drive long distances in harsh weather to pick up and deliver heavy food boxes.

Last year, Allen urged her team, “Find me someone strong with a truck.” They had lost a 78-year-old volunteer when his wife fell ill, leaving no one to transport hundreds of pounds of food weekly.

Through community connections, Allen found 67-year-old Bryan MacLaren. Unfortunately, after a few months, he required knee surgery, forcing the pantry to search again.

Since March, food supplies from Good Shepherd to Maine’s pantries have been reduced by 50% or more. Neighbor’s Cupboard has managed to maintain its distribution, partly thanks to a local food drive in May that collected 5,000 pounds of donations. However, changes loom on the horizon.

In late August, Good Shepherd informed pantries that due to rising demand, those running low on stock could now restrict service to local residents only-a departure from their longstanding policy of providing food to all in need.

Allen firmly rejected this shift.

“We will continue to serve everyone,” she declared in an email to The Maine Monitor.