Ohio food stamp use increases by 71 percent since 2000 [View All]

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http://www.ohio.com/mld/ohio/news/16670516.htm

COLUMBUS, Ohio - The number of Ohioans receiving food stamps has increased by 71 percent since the year 2000.

The Department of Job and Family Services says that in Franklin County -- home to the state capital of Columbus -- food stamp use has more than doubled. It's more than tripled in central Ohio's Union County, home to Marysville.

In other urban counties of Cuyahoga and Hamilton, food stamp participation has increased by about half in the past six years.

Agency spokesman Jon Allen says the number of people getting state help to buy food has always been an indicator of a poor economy...



Hungry in Ohio

Dramatic jump in use of food stamps underscores troubling trend across state

http://www.columbusdispatch.com/news-story.php?story=dispatch/2007/02/10/20070210-A1-00.html

Saturday, February 10, 2007
Rita Price
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
Hungry in Ohio

...In Franklin and the six surrounding counties, food-stamp recipient rates grew more than 100 percent between 2000 and 2006...

The job and wage stagnation that have long plagued the northeastern and southeastern regions of the state seem to be reaching central Ohio, said Laura Holton of the Fairfield County Department of Job and Family Services...

"A majority of these families are working families, and I think the public really needs to hear that," Holton said."Our unemployment rate might not be that bad, but the wages just aren’t enough."...

Doris McShine, a 24-year-old veteran who returned from Iraq 14 months ago, got her first food-stamp card last month. McShine said she returned to Delaware to resume her studies at Ohio Wesleyan University...