The esteemed Second Harvest Food Bank of the Mahoning Valley and the robust network of similar nonprofits in the Ohio Association of Foodbanks have never met a challenge they could not slay. Over the years, their critical mission has been far too important to let any pesky nuisances such as a national economic recession or a global health pandemic stand in their way of delivering essential food assistance to tens of thousands in the Valley and millions in Ohio.

That’s why we’re confident that the same stellar resilient history of overcoming adversity will again shift into high gear as they confront a new and potentially crushing challenge brought to them by our state and federal governments.

From Columbus, the 2026-27 state budget recently signed by Gov. Mike DeWine provides $75 million less in aid to food banks across Ohio compared with 2024 levels.

From Washington, the Donald Trump administration has canceled more than $1 billion in federal funds for food banks, including dollars needed to buy fresh and healthful produce from local farmers. Then, earlier this month, Congress took a meat ax to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, the nation’s primary food assistance program, by adopting Trump’s One Big Beautiful Act that cuts taxes and slashes spending across the board.

According to Feeding America, the national association of food banks, those cuts translate into a loss of up to 9 billion meals provided annually to food-insecure Americans.

State and national food bank leaders deem those looming cuts as crises that will force them to greatly expand their inventories from private sources to meet projected bumps in demand. As Joree Novotny, executive director of the Ohio Association of Foodbanks, put it in a text message, “There is no world in which I can imagine we double ourselves into perpetuity.”

Sadly, those cuts in government aid are not being matched by any significant reductions in need or demand.

In the Mahoning Valley, for example, food insecurity regrettably continues to run rampant. According to new data released July 1 by the Ohio Association of Foodbanks for Trumbull, Mahoning and Columbiana counties:

• 89,000 people, including 25,700 children, are considered food insecure, meaning they very well may have no clue as to when and where they’ll find their next meal or if there will be a next meal.

• 91,000 individuals are enrolled in the SNAP food-stamp program, which faces those draconian cutbacks.

• 470,000 visits to the 160 food pantries in the three counties under the umbrella of SHFBMV were made in 2024.

Fortunately, however, for those in the Valley who rely on SHFBMV and its 14 dozen pantries in schools, churches and mobile units, the foreseeable future appears not nearly as bleak as some state and national food assistance leaders predict.

In an interview this week with this newspaper, Michael Iberis, longtime respected executive director of the SHFBMV, expressed strong confidence in the local food bank’s ability to successfully battle the pending cuts.

“We intend to make it up by using the many contacts we have,” he said.

Those contacts are many that have long invested in the benevolent mission of Second Harvest. They include farmers, grocery stores, corporations, small businesses, private foundations and a bountiful cornucopia of community support.

Iberis said his operation relies most heavily on the generosity of its donors and the hard work of its brigade of 150 volunteers at its sprawling warehouse and distribution site on Salt Springs Road in Youngstown.

Such support is understandable given the superlative image and financial management of the approximately $5 million annual operation. The executive director reports only 5 measly percent of its total funding goes to administrative costs. As a result, it is ranked in the upper echelons of Charity Navigator with the coveted four-star rating.

Many will recall that it was that record of prudent financial management that motivated Mackenzie Scott, ex-wife of former Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, to donate an astronomical $3 million to the food bank a few years back.

That same record of prudent financial management today also likely explains its broad-based community support that is helping it weather the incoming hits from Columbus and Washington.

Nonetheless, its ability to meet its projections of distributing 11 million pounds of food this year — or about 50,000 pounds daily — to meet relentlessly ongoing food-insecurity needs rides on continuation and expansion of the characteristic generosity that so defines the Mahoning Valley community.

There are many ways to help. Caring residents can organize a food drive, make a monetary donation to the SHFBMV (go to mahoningvalleysecondharvest.org to do so) or volunteer their time at the warehouse or at pantries.

The life-changing good works of Feeding America and Second Harvest make a compelling case for Valley residents from all walks of life to commit to at least one concrete action to battle the new challenges and to ease the relentless pangs and plight of hunger among us.