LEBANON — On a Thursday afternoon in September, Madeleine Campbell braved a rare downpour to stock up on produce for her family at the Lebanon Farmers Market.
Her husband, Alec Branson, has been receiving treatment for kidney failure since 2021 and the family, which also includes two children, has been relying on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, to help cover the cost of groceries while Campbell acts a full-time caregiver to Branson and their kids.
At the Lebanon Farmers Market, Campbell, 30, of Windsor, is able to use her SNAP benefits to buy groceries and fresh produce.
“I really, really love the ability to shop at farmers markets with SNAP,” Campbell said. “It so incentivizes buying produce.”
An average of 41.7 million people used SNAP each month, according to the U.S Department of Agriculture. The program is available to families and individuals whose gross monthly income sits at or below 130% of the federal poverty line. Every month, an allotted amount of money is placed onto the user’s electronic benefit transfer, or EBT, card, which is used to purchase fresh produce, meat, dairy, non-alcoholic beverages and seeds.
Roughly 76,900 New Hampshire residents used SNAP and 66,500 Vermont residents used 3SquaresVT, the state’s version of SNAP, last year, according to the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities.
The future of SNAP currently stands on shaky ground as the Trump administration’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act includes $186 billion in cuts to the program through 2034. The new law also introduces work requirements that will affect seniors, veterans, unhoused people and parents with children age 14 and older.
For people like Campbell and her family, who rely on SNAP to cover the cost of groceries, these new requirements and other changes to the program create fear and uncertainty about access to fresh produce going forward.
Family caregiving
Because of her husband’s health issues, “healthy food is very important to me,” Campbell said.
Last month, she embarked on what she called “Souptember,” during which she made a different vegetable soup as often as she could, “much to my husband’s dread,” she joked.
The Lebanon and Norwich farmers markets have become regular stops for Campbell because they make it possible to source local fruits and veggies, and their matching programs help her stretch her SNAP benefits.
At the Norwich Farmers Market, every dollar in SNAP spent at the market yields an extra dollar in Crop Cash, which can be used for fruits and vegetables. An additional dollar of Crop Cash Plus can be used for SNAP-eligible items like bread and meat. Both Crop Cash and Crop Cash Plus match SNAP dollars up to $20.
Meanwhile, at the Lebanon Farmers Market, SNAP users can convert their benefits into SNAP dollars to purchase groceries that would be eligible for purchase with their EBT card. The market also offers a matching program through Granite State Market Match, which is funded by the New Hampshire Food Bank, that matches SNAP dollars with veggie dollars that can be used to purchase fruits and vegetables.
Campbell has always loved to cook, but her family’s circumstances “have made it so it’s not just for fun.”
Shopping at the farmers market has inserted some playfulness back into the process of preparing and cooking meals for her family. Unlike a routine trip to the grocery store, visiting the farmers market makes grocery shopping more of an occasion.
On that Thursday, she picked up a variety of squashes, leeks and other produce.
Meeting up with a friend for a cup of coffee also isn’t really in her budget at the moment, but the farmers market is a place where she can socialize without creating additional financial strain.
Bringing her kids, Mary, 5, and Marcy, 2, to the market also creates an opportunity to teach them about where their food comes from.
Normally Mary shows no interest in eating her veggies, but when she’s helped pick them out and prepare them with Campbell, she’s more open-minded. When the two of them go to the farmers market, Campbell with often buy her a container of cherry tomatoes that she’ll polish off by the time they’ve finished shopping.
At the moment, Campbell is in the process of registering as Marcy and Mary’s primary caregiver so that the family can continue to receive their current allotment of SNAP benefits, which is $900 a month.
Otherwise, because she doesn’t fulfill the minimum work requirement of 30 hours a week at federal minimum wage, she would lose her portion of the benefits.
If that happens, “we will have to make some decisions about how we can change what we’re eating,” she said. “(We’d) probably have to rely more on dry goods…and fewer fresh vegetables.”
Getting by
That same rainy September day, Sofia Lesage, another SNAP user, also stopped by the Lebanon Farmers Market to pick up supplies.
An alum of the Center for Cartoon Studies in White River Junction, Lesage works about 14 hours a week as a clerk at the Lebanon Library where she makes a little over $18 an hour. The library doesn’t offer benefits, but she’s occasionally able to pick up extra shifts, and she enjoys her work.
“I see a lot of people who are less fortunate than I am,” working at the library, she said in an interview at her apartment. “Libraries are the last warm place with a bathroom where people feel comfortable.”
Lesage lives with chronic back pain as well as mental health challenges that makes it difficult to pick up another job. She’s also in the process of getting a Certificate of Public Librarianship through the state, so she needs the extra time in her week to study.
Because she only makes about $1,100 a month, Lesage, 24, uses SNAP benefits to help cover her monthly grocery bill.
“I’m poor as dirt,” she said.
She previously received $292 in monthly SNAP benefits, but that number was slashed to $42 a month since she moved to a new apartment in White River Junction where she doesn’t have an electric bill.
Even though the move meant her rent increased by 10%, the lack of an electric bill, which saves $35, reduced how much money she was eligible for through SNAP because she only qualified for the Basic Utility Allowance instead of the Standard Utility Allowance.
Lesage also risks losing her benefits entirely because she doesn’t meet a work requirement that was waived during the coronavirus pandemic, but has since been reinstated. Under the requirement, able-bodied individuals must work at least 30 hours a week at federal minimum wage, about double the hours Lesage works now.
In the meantime, the Lebanon Farmers Market’s matching program has helped supplement Lesage’s SNAP benefits and provide access to locally grown produce.
On that Thursday, she purchased a large tomato from Ascutney Harvest, a vegetable farm.
“I like to buy from real farmers,” Lesage said.
Usually one or two SNAP users purchase produce at Ascutney Harvest’s stall each week, said the farm’s co-founder, Lauren Mucha.
The market’s SNAP dollars and the Granite State Market Match program make it possible for people “to buy veggies who otherwise might not,” she said, and customers will often inquire about how to cook a particular vegetable, or weigh a certain item.
During her trip to the market, Lesage also purchased a package of sausages that she planned to use in a shepherd’s pie.
“I definitely wouldn’t have gotten that,” without the market’s SNAP dollars, said Lesage, who described herself as a “poverty vegetarian.”
Nutrition for seniors
While the Lebanon and Norwich farmers markets provide people using SNAP with a little bit of extra funds to use on fresh produce, the Bugbee Senior Center in White River Junction participates in a federally-funded program that does the same for low-income seniors.
Funded through the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Farm to Family for Seniors provides participants at the Bugbee Center with a $48 booklet of coupons to use for fruits and vegetables at participating farmers markets and farm stands in the state.
“You know it’s obviously huge for the people participating — the individuals — but I also see it as a huge economic stimulus program,” said state Rep. Esme Cole, D-Hartford, who oversees the program at Bugbee. “All that money … coming from the federal government is going straight down into local economies.”
This season, 65 seniors were eligible to enroll in the program. Among them was 73-year-old Nancy Jarvis, who lives with her cat, Gizmo, at Graystone Village, an apartment complex in White River Junction.
The coupons help “add a little bit more,” to Jarvis’ grocery budget, she said. They also help her afford produce at the Norwich Farmers Market.
Accessing nutritious food is a priority for Jarvis, who struggles with back pain from an injury she sustained while working as a licensed nursing assistant. She also takes medication for diabetes and arthritis, among other ailments.
“You’re going to end up sick if you don’t get the right nutrition in your food,” she said. “You don’t want to go take vitamin pills, I’d rather use food.”
Jarvis usually visits the Norwich Farmers Market once every two weeks. She drives herself, but Bugbee also offers transportation for seniors who need assistance. Jarvis also buys produce at Sterns Quality Produce in White River Junction.
To save money, Jarvis cooks almost every meal from scratch. Sometimes, she’ll make extra and freeze it for another day. Other times, she’ll share what she’s made with other seniors and employees at Bugbee.
Lately she’s been gravitating towards battered zucchini and vegetable lasagnas, which she makes using produce purchased at the Norwich Farmers Market. Sometimes, when her back is really hurting, she’ll chop vegetables at her dining room table.
Even with the coupons from Bugbee and the $211 she receives in SNAP, money for groceries and household items is tight by the end of the month. To supplement what she receives in SNAP, Jarvis also has a power of attorney that enables her to access an allowance of $135 a month and $1,700 in Social Security, some of which goes towards medical insurance.
A single mother who spent 18 years working back-to-back shifts at the now-closed Kleen dry cleaners in White River Junction and at Shaw’s, most of Jarvis’ income went toward supporting her family. “Workaholic, they call it,” she said.
These days, she worries about how the Trump administration could strip back SNAP and Social Security benefits. Adjustments under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act means that what people receive in SNAP isn’t adjusted for cost of living. Meanwhile, the Trump administration has threatened to cut Social Security benefits for hundreds of thousands of low-income disabled people and seniors.
“If that stuff all goes…what the heck are we going to do? You’ve got to have food to live. You’ve got to have that nutrition,” she said. “A lot of people work hard to survive, and this is about survival.”
