With SNAP Benefit Freeze, Clevelanders Face Question of How to Feed Themselves, and Their Pets – Cleveland Scene

After a little more than two decades working as a software engineer, making well into the six figures and even owning his own company, Jay found himself unemployed and out of a job in January, a byproduct of AI.

That began an era of loss. Job applications went unanswered. His savings dwindled while trying to keep up with his and his wife’s home in Brooklyn. He lost his car insurance. He forever gave up his confidence in the White House. “I voted for Trump,” Jay, 41, told Scene. “This is my fault.”

By August, Jay’s pride fizzled. He needed help. He applied to the government’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, casually known as food stamps, and got approved for $759 a month, to feed himself, his wife and their three-year-old daughter. (They used the funds mostly on pasta and frozen meatballs.)

Yet, in light of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s impending freeze on SNAP funds come Nov. 1, Jay now has another bundle of anxiety: How to feed his cat, Nebula, and his two dogs, Sandy and Jinx.

“It costs a ton already,” Jay said in a phone call. “I can’t even say. I hunt down which of the dollar stores has the cheapest dog food and cat food. But it adds up; it’s not cheap.”

Democrats and Republicans are currently, as of Friday, in a standstill as far what it will take to end what’s been so far the second-longest government shutdown in U.S. history, at 30 days and counting.

Cities, counties and states are trying to make up at least some of the difference, but SNAP benefits are expensive, and more than 42 million Americans rely on them. In Cuyahoga County, there are some 190,000 reidents who need their EBT cards to keep pantries and refrigerators stocked.

As of September, SNAP gives its receivers up to $297 a month per person, which amounts to $9 a day, or roughly $3 per meal. But throw two teenagers in the mix, maybe a border collie or two, a hamster and a goldfish, and those leaning on D.C. to keep them alive this fall are heading towards the previously unthinkable.

“People are gonna have to make a choice, right?” Anne Konarski, a SNAP policy expert who studies hunger for a Cleveland nonprofit and owns three dogs, said. “Do you feed your kids or do you feed your pets?”

In interviews with four local pet food pantries, all of them told Scene that they’ve strengthened their relationship with regional food banks and the Hunger Network, the largest food distributor in Cleveland, in the past year—both out of necessity and an empathy for pet owners that walk in on a routine basis.

A routine that’s become more dire in the past week or so, as a subset of their clientele wonder how they’re going to make it to Thanksgiving while keeping their pets healthy and nourished to see December. Or, as some expressed to Scene, whether they might be forced to give them up to a local shelter, many of which are already at capacity and facing budget issues of their own, or let them loose on the street.

“They can and will turn to animal shelters and say, ‘I can’t afford my pet anymore’,” Sharon Harvey, president of the Cleveland Animal Protective League, said. “Or, ‘If you can’t help me with what I need for my pet, can you take it and find it a new home?’”

Harvey, like the others that bring in boxes of food, relies primarily on donations to bag and distribute food to pet owners. Times have gotten harder. Harvey helped dole out 17 tons of pet food last year; near the end of September, they had already sent out 20 tons in 2025.

The same is true for Wayne Campbell, who’s been running Paws For Purpose’s pet food pantry in Lake County for the past five years.

Donors haven’t been as reliable this year, he said. And as a result, PFP is in more need of supply (amid climbing grocery costs) and facing more demand.

All while trying to keep true to PFP’s mission: keep pets out of and away from shelters.

“I mean, we used to give out 80 bags of cat food, 80 bags of dog food with dry treats and canned food, and we’re up to about 160 now of each,” he said. “It’s just, you know, the need is getting greater and greater.”

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine on Thursday signed an executive order providing $25 million in emergency relief in the face of the impending food disaster, with $7 million going to food banks and $18 million going to about 63,000 Ohioans directly. But it’s a small drop in the bucket. About $34 million would be needed to fully fund just Cuyahoga County’s portion of SNAP benefits for November.

Cleveland and Cuyahoga County officials are convening Friday morning to announce what will be their proposal to help cover the gap left by the SNAP freeze. Leaders will, a press release read, “discuss the urgency of addressing the needs of Cuyahoga County residents.”

As for their pets?

Over in Slavic Village on Thursday afternoon, Becca Britton helped lug in boxes of canned tuna and dried dog food, kibbles her volunteers soon scooped into Ziploc bags and handed out to the dozen or so waiting in line in the lobby. (A quarter of which were on SNAP.)

“It’s heartbreaking, even just right now,” Britton said, as her volunteers shuffled around her, some bagging pellets or tending to clientele. “We just don’t know. But I do think—sad as it is to say—that it’s going to get to the point where people are going to have to surrender their pets.”

Close by was Taymar Ethington and her two boys, who stopped by Neighborhood Pets on Thursday to pick up food, toys and a leash for their puppy, Prince.

Ethington, a single mom living at a nearby apartment building, said the up-in-the-air situation with SNAP has propelled her to extend her gathering outward: to the Greater Cleveland Food Bank, to churches, to the Salvation Army. She even set up a pantry nook in her building to help out fellow SNAP receipients.

“I’ve been stocking my pantry, filling up my deep freezer,” she told Scene, as her boys waited nearby. “Things like that. Filling up my canned goods.”

As for Prince, Ethington said he’s going nowhere.

“He’s just a little puppy,” she said. “He doesn’t cost too much to feed.”

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