- Hunger is a growing problem in America and could soon get worse.

Food pantries and soup kitchens throughout the US and here in Rhode Island are struggling to keep up.

One organization at the center of the response is the Rhode Island Community Food Bank.

It distributes millions of pounds of food each year to those who need it most.

Melissa Cherney became the nonprofit's executive director in September, 2025.

So why is it so hard to wipe out hunger in one of the world's richest nations?

And what does that tell us?

I'm Ian Donnis, and that's just some of what we talked about in this in-depth conversation.

(light dramatic music) Melissa Cherney, CEO of the Rhode Island Community Food Bank, welcome to "One on One."

- Thank you, I'm excited to be here.

- Let's cut right to the chase.

We know that America is a very prosperous country, but it has a big and growing problem of hunger with almost 50 million Americans being at risk for hunger.

How does this happen?

- You know, I wish I knew.

I wish I had a magic wand and could really end hunger.

But I've spent 20 years in hunger relief, both here now in Rhode Island and also at the Great Plains Food Bank in North Dakota.

And the bottom line is, I wish I could say we were closer to ending hunger today than we were.

We're not.

Hunger persists.

The lines are getting longer.

We hear more and more people that are having trouble making ends meet.

You and I have bought groceries.

We know that the price is going up.

It's getting harder and harder for families to put food on their table every single day.

- What's the situation like in Rhode Island?

How do we- do we fare better or worse than other states in meeting the need of our hungry residents?

- You know, I think, so I'm on a national committee with Feeding America.

And often we're talking about what is everyone seeing in all 50 states.

And we are seeing about the same thing.

We're seeing more and more people.

We're seeing people that are just, they're working, they're maybe working multiple jobs, are not able to make ends meet, and more and more people in our lines.

And as food banks, we're doing more and serving more people with less resources.

So we're getting less food donated than we ever have before.

We're stretching, making sure that no one is going hungry, that they're getting some food.

But that's getting harder and harder for us to do every day.

And so we've really had to evolve how we work.

So instead of relying primarily on donated product, which is what we used to do, we're purchasing food.

And that's a new trend in food banks.

So we're purchasing about 40% of our inventory.

It's certainly more expensive to do that work, but it's also an opportunity for what we think of as hunger prevention.

How do we invest in our local farmers, our local fishers, make sure our local economy is doing well so that we can keep them out of our lines as well?

- What's the level of need today right now in Rhode Island?

What do people need to know about the level of support for the food bank and the local organizations that you help to support?

- Absolutely.

So I have been here now seven months.

And when I started Rhode Island, the food bank was serving about 89,000 individuals.

Now we're over 102,000 every single month.

And if you think that we have jumped that high in just a few months, that's a lot of additional people.

We're seeing it primarily because of the SNAP changes and change to SNAP benefits.

Doesn't mean that people stop eating.

It might mean that they're getting less benefits than they have before.

It may mean that they have been cut off of benefits.

But they still need food.

And so they're turning to us, and they're turning to our network of member agencies in droves.

And we're doing everything that we can to keep up.

And we now see ourselves as sort of the safety net of the federal safety net.

And I wish I could tell you that we're able to keep up, but we're not.

- We'll talk more about SNAP shortly.

- Yes.

- The Federal Nutrition Assistance Program.

But wars always have unintended consequences.

And we see now how the war in Iran is causing gas prices to spike.

It's upsetting supply chains.

How do you expect this to affect the problem of food prices and hunger in Rhode Island?

- You know, I wish I had a crystal ball and I knew what was coming.

What I can tell you is that families were struggling before.

And we heard everyday stories about people choosing to pay for heat or rent or food or gas in their car.

And this is just going to exacerbate that problem, and they're going to be making tougher choices.

And not only that, but I'm also, as the CEO of the food bank, I have to think about what does it cost for us to bring food in?

What does it cost for us to distribute that food all across the state?

And that's something that's keeping me up at night, because there's so much uncertainty around it.

- Melissa, I've gotta ask you, beyond keeping you up at night, if a decision of our federal government, the White House, has downstream effects of causing more inflation for Americans and worsening the problem of hunger?

Does that make you angry?

- I think, you know, it does make me angry, but I also believe that you can be angry and hold hope at the same time.

One of the things that I have realized here in Rhode Island is when we put a call out, people stand beside us and people respond.

The community steps up.

And so there may be changes every single day that will impact hunger.

But I also know that if we tell our community that we need them now more than ever, they will step up, stand beside us, and make sure that their neighbors aren't going hungry.

- How else can that anger be directed in a productive fashion?

- Absolutely, there's a lot of ways.

And I think, you know, I'm working through this with my staff every day too, as they're talking with people who are angry.

And it's like, get involved.

We have a very close knit community in Rhode Island.

People can donate food to their local food pantry.

If you donate funds, we ask that they go to the Rhode Island Community Food Bank, because we're able to purchase our food in bulk and get a really good price by leveraging our dollars.

People can get involved by advocacy, using their voice, and volunteering.

There's a lot of opportunity.

- Let's talk a little bit more about you.

You worked for many years- - Yes.

- In North Dakota.

You came to Rhode Island last year.

What was it that made you wanna come from North Dakota- - Yes.

- To Rhode Island?

- Well, I'm a North Dakota native.

I'm a farm girl and loved North Dakota.

And you know, was working at the food bank there for about 18 years.

And I got recruited to come here.

And so the first time that I talked with the recruiter and the board, I was just incredibly impressed by how much passion there was within the board who are all volunteers.

And I'll be honest, I'd never been to Rhode Island before.

Came for my interview, wasn't sure what to expect, and I fell in love with the state.

I will tell you, your piano player at the airport.

Man, I flew in, I went down the escalator, heard that piano music, and I said, "I don't know where I am, but this is home."

That was the most beautiful welcome I have ever had.

And I am just loving every second of Rhode Island.

- We were talking, before the taping, about some of the quirks of Rhode Island.

- Yes.

- About how you had, I think, a 25 minute commute when you were in North Dakota.

Now that's considered a fairly lengthy drive in little Rhode Island.

What has most surprised you about Rhode Island, either regarding hunger or not regarding hunger?

- Well, I will tell you one of the things that excites me the most is the seafood.

We did not have fresh seafood in North Dakota, as you could imagine.

And I love the fact that it's a smaller state.

So when, in North Dakota, when I would send a truck full of food out, it would be days before I would see them again as they made the trek across 70,000 square miles.

And here, you know, when you think about hunger relief, it's really important to get that food as quickly as possible to people who need it.

We can do that in a very short amount of time here.

And I think that's what really sets Rhode Island apart and excites me the most, is if we wanna end hunger, I think this is the place to do it.

Because we have such close proximity, and we can get everywhere in a short amount of time.

- You mentioned how the food bank is now buying a lot more food- - Yeah.

- Because of changes in the food industry.

There is a local agriculture movement, although the number of farms from the past is way down in Rhode Island and most states.

Does this offer a nexus for helping to sustain more local agriculture and more local food producers?

- It sure does.

And we have been talking with the Ag Commissioner.

And being a farm girl myself, agriculture and farming is near and dear to my heart.

And we're exploring things like contract growing.

Can we pay farmers in advance for their crops to grow us some produce?

Not only is that a viable market and a guaranteed market for them, it's great, fresh, local produce for us as well.

And so I think that this is a really incredible opportunity to think through how can we invest in farms?

Because if we don't have farmers and fishers and ranchers, we don't have food.

And so the bottom line is we need them to do well so that the consumers can do well and get that product as well.

So I really see it as a win-win and a way for us to advance not only hunger relief, but making sure that we are growing safe, culturally-responsive food that can get out to every corner of the state.

- Tell us about the spectrum of people who are affected by hunger, and what is the typical person?

- Yeah.

I always like to say that hunger hides in plain sight.

You can't tell if somebody's hungry by looking at them.

And I can guarantee a lot of people would not expect from me to have grown up hungry.

We grew food to feed the world, and I was incredibly proud of that.

But when you are farming and when you're in agriculture, you rely on the weather and you rely on the markets.

And there was a lot of times that my brother and I were free lunch kids that we never knew.

And also if you fast forward to college, as a struggling college student, I couldn't pay for tuition and books and rent and the meal plan.

And so something had to give.

And for me, it was the meal plan.

And I started a job in the catering department.

So I know that I was guaranteed a meal at the end of my shift.

I also went on SNAP my junior year of college.

And I will tell you that is not something I ever talked about until I was at the food bank in North Dakota for about 10 years.

And as I was talking with people, there was someone who said, "How do you know that those people really need the services?

How do we know that those people really need and deserve our help?"

And for the first time in my life, it hit me in my heart that I was one of those people.

And it was at that point that I knew I needed to share my story.

And if I couldn't be brave enough to do that, how could I ask anyone else to?

And we need to change the narrative around hunger.

Because in Rhode Island, one in three households is food insecure.

That's a neighbor, that's a coworker, that's a colleague, that is someone that you know.

And you would never know it by looking at them.

So it's working families, it's individuals just like you and me who maybe are one paycheck away from crisis.

And that happens.

And so hunger hides in plain sight.

There isn't a typical hungry person.

It can happen to any one of us.

- Melissa, as you've just said, there can be a stigma for people who accept assistance programs.

The Trump administration has highlighted this in Minnesota.

- Yes.

- Certainly there is some degree of wrongdoing in any kind of program.

Hopefully it's small.

But results show that there's more problems with the SNAP program in Rhode Island than some other states.

Does that make it harder to build support for these programs?

And what can be done about that?

- You know, I don't know that it makes it harder.

The Federal Nutrition Program of SNAP, it's an income qualified program.

I can tell you going through the application process and the interview process is quite rigorous.

It's hard to ask for help.

It's hard to apply for assistance.

It's also hard to commit fraud.

They- it is an incredibly effective program.

But when there are error rates, like everyone is talking about right now, that does highlight that no program is perfect.

But at the end of the day, when you look at the error rate, it's still low.

And I know how hard it is to ask for help.

And there are so many people who are only able to put food on their tables because of SNAP and because of federal nutrition programs that, at the end of the day, as long as people are getting food that need it, I feel good about it.

- The Trump administration's budget bill will move the responsibility for much of SNAP to the states later this year.

How will that affect the program here in Rhode Island?

- You know, actually what we're seeing across the country is states looking at how they're going to respond very differently.

Not only will states have to pay for some of the administrative costs and some of the benefits, but there are program changes as well that will kick some people off of their SNAP benefits or cut their benefits.

And every state now has the opportunity to handle that differently.

We have been in conversations with DHS where everything was on the table.

How do we make ends meet for both the state and make sure people are getting fed?

- You mean the State Department of Human Services?

- Correct, yes.

- Yep.

- And so there's a lot of conversations about how do they raise additional revenue?

Or how can we work with the federal government to make them realize the impact that this has on the state?

And ultimately how that's going to impact the people in need.

Really, that's, at the end of the day, we're thinking about, "How do we make sure they get food?"

And there isn't a quick and easy answer.

I don't know that our state has it completely figured out.

I don't know that any state has it completely figured out.

But what has been happening here in Rhode Island is that DHS and all of the state government have been working alongside of us to say, "We know that people are not going to stop eating.

We all have a priority to make sure they get fed.

Let's brainstorm some ways that we can make the error rate less so that people aren't getting kicked off of benefits and the state doesn't have to absorb more."

- The previous government shutdown last year was very disruptive, including for people who receive SNAP benefits.

What lessons did you take away from that?

And is that causing any changes in how things work here on the ground in Rhode Island?

- Yeah, so when that happened last November, it was a bit of a rude awakening.

And I had only been here a few months.

And I will tell you, not only did we see people go without paychecks.

Our federal government employees went weeks without paychecks.

SNAP actually wasn't distributed for the first time ever in our history.

And we sounded the alarm.

And what I was most proud of is that the state government stood beside us.

It was public-private partnerships coming together, saying, "This is a crisis.

We need to act with urgency.

We need to sound the alarm now."

And the community and public-private entities all stepped up.

We saw an incredible outpouring of community support, of state support, saying, "What can we do to help?"

And everybody finding their role in hunger relief.

And I think, you know, as detrimental as that was, it also shone a light on how important federal nutrition programs are.

We will never fundraise or food bank our way out of hunger.

There is just no way that we can do that.

SNAP, in the state of Rhode Island alone, every month distributes $29 million in benefits.

So not only is that helping people put food on their table, they're using those dollars locally.

So they're purchasing from local growers and local grocers and farmer's markets, investing back in our economy.

And $29 million a month is a million dollars a day.

There is no way that a food banker, a charitable system, could make up for that.

And so I think the lesson that we all learned was we have to work together.

That this is not an issue that can be solved by one entity alone.

But let's get creative.

Let's stand beside each other.

Let's collaborate in new and exciting ways.

And that that will actually advance the solution of ending hunger.

- There was a time when the US had largely eliminated epidemic hunger.

And the problem came roaring back in the early 1980s due to cuts supported by both Democrats and Republicans.

What are your reflections on how the government kind of walked away from eliminating that as a serious problem?

- You know, I think what we see is there's always competing priorities and competing issues.

And what we have an obligation to do is talk about the fact that hunger exists, hunger persists.

It is not getting better.

Food is a most basic need for people.

This is an issue that doesn't go away.

And so there may be things that are louder or brighter in the news, but this is something that we need to keep sounding the alarm on.

We, I think, have seen opportunities where things, where times when we've gotten better, there have been times when we've been worse.

But again, I think you can be angry about all of that.

And I think you can hold hope and say, "Okay, we have a new challenge in front of us.

What new solutions can we deploy?

How can we work together in new and creative ways?

And how do we make sure that this issue remains a priority and at the forefront of all discussions?"

- You referred earlier to how it's registered with many people, not just those at risk for hunger, how the cost of food is way up.

- Yes.

- Is this the new normal?

Can you anticipate food prices going down over time?

Or do you think this is just the way it is?

- You know, every time I like to think, "Oh, we're gonna go back to how it was," we never do.

And so, you know, I've been talking with my team and even within Feeding America.

We are really learning to accept that this is probably the new normal.

Once it go- once prices go up, it's really hard to scale back.

And so we are thinking through how can we do more with less?

How can we get more efficient?

How can we be more effective?

And right now, we know that the cost of food is continuing to rise.

We distribute right now about 18 million pounds of food a year.

So that's about 1.5 million pounds a month.

And we are able to get a pound of food for a dollar.

So right now, it's a, you know, 1.5 million every single month that we're distributing.

We know that as prices continue to rise, not only for you and I as consumers, but when we're purchasing in bulk, that number is going to continue to increase.

And when we have more people in need, we have less dollars, and our dollars don't stretch as far.

We're in a pretty precarious situation.

And I think that's the call to action with everyone right now, is if you can donate food, donate food.

If you can donate funds, donate funds.

This is an issue that affects every single one of us every single day.

- Melissa, you're an executive leading an organization.

You're a service-driven organization.

I wonder if you can tell me a story about one of the people who you assist that kind of underscores the importance of the work that the food bank does?

- Yes, I mean, every single day, we are- we're hearing people's stories.

And you know, there's one that sticks with me that recently happened, and it was a senior who is living independently and has a dog at home.

And they get Meals on Wheels.

They also are able to go to their local food pantry and get food.

But there are times when, at the end of the month, there may not be enough food to stretch.

And the phone call I got was from a woman who said, "You know, I just got my Meals on Wheels.

I don't have any dog food in the house.

And so I shared my meal with my best friend."

And that's her companion and her friend.

And you know, we don't often think about how caring people are to take care of others before themselves.

And that's a reminder to us that people are going through tough times.

They are making decisions to take care of themselves, their loved ones, their pets.

And they're making tough choices.

And I also know that she was saying, "My medication says take with food.

I don't have food, so I'm not taking my medication."

When you hear those things, it breaks your heart.

And it also compels you to say, "We can do better.

We should do better.

And let's step up and do it."

- It's hard to separate what you're talking about from the economy.

And here in Rhode Island, there have been efforts to reinvent the economy for many decades.

Rhode Island, you know, 100 years ago was a very prosperous place.

And then the Industrial Revolution petered out over time.

So how much responsibility do you put on politicians for not being able, over the course of many decades, to build a stronger economy that would result in fewer people being hungry?

- You know, I'm not an economist.

I will tell you, I know that that is a very hard job.

And I also know that if there was an easy solution to all of this, we probably would've figured it out by now.

What I think we can do is continue to sound the alarm that this is an issue.

We need to work on it.

And I think bringing new people together to think of innovative ways that maybe we haven't tried before, or even solutions that maybe we have tried that didn't work, that were ahead of their time, that might work now.

So I think it's just reminding people hunger exists.

Food insecurity is a real issue.

We can't just rely on our laurels to get us by.

But how do we bring everyone together, new politician, new ideas, old ideas, and actually have the political will to make change?

- We tend to hear a lot about the food bank and more generally charitable giving around the holidays.

- Yeah.

- Is it harder to get support at other times of the year like now?

- It is.

I think people are obviously thinking about giving back around Thanksgiving and Christmas.

What people may not realize is hunger usually increases during the summer.

That's when kids are home from school.

They're not getting their school lunches.

And parents are strapped.

And so we'll see our numbers increase, but we'll also see people who are thinking of summers and vacations and maybe not thinking about charity.

And that's the time that we need it the most.

Hunger doesn't take a vacation.

That's what we can say.

We need support year round.

We love when you think about us at the holidays, but that is not the only time that people are going hungry.

- To close out our discussion, Melissa, if people watching and listening to our interview want to do to help with the situation, what are some of the different ways they can try and make the situation better?

- Absolutely.

There's a lot of ways to get engaged.

There are 137 food pantries and shelters and soup kitchens all across the state.

Look at getting involved by volunteering with them, donating food directly to them, because it will get on people's tables tonight.

You can donate funds to the Rhode Island Community Food Bank, where we can leverage your dollar and purchase in bulk.

Just share and spread the word, advocate and amplify the fact that hunger exists, and be a part of the solution.

The only way we're gonna solve this is if we're all working together, linking arms, building a movement to end hunger.

And we invite people to join us in any way that they can.

- Melissa Cherney, CEO of the Rhode Island Community Food Bank, thank you so much- - Thank you.

- For sitting down with us.

- Appreciate it.

- Thanks for watching "One on One" with me, Ian Donnis.

You can find all of our past interviews on the YouTube channel for Ocean State Media.

We'll see you next week.

(low dramatic music)