By Voice staff

The Mercy Brown Bag Program, a food giveaway for low-income seniors sponsored by Mercy Retirement and Care Center in Oakland, is one of the latest non-profit services to be affected by California’s budget woes.

Krista Lucchesi, Brown Bag director, said both the City of Oakland and the State of California have told her not to expect any funding from them for the next fiscal year. That’s a loss of $19,979 from the state and $25,000 from Oakland, she said. The cuts add up to a 24.5 percent drop in the program’s 2009-2010 budget.

Lucchesi said reductions were already beginning to take place midyear, when Oakland trimmed $12,500 from the original $25,000 for 2008-2009. The State of California cut $1,600, bringing its total funding to $18,379.

The Brown Bag program’s total yearly budget is $180,000 which comes from grants and donations to pay for staffing, some food, and maintenance of delivery vehicles. Another $1.5 million comes from in-kind donations.

The Mercy Brown Bag Program has been providing twice-monthly bags of groceries to low-income seniors since 1982. The program began after elders living at Mercy Retirement and Care Center in Oakland saw that many over-60 people in the neighborhood were having a hard time making food dollars stretch over a month’s time. So they went to Mercy Sister Patricia Creedon, now the chief executive officer, to see how they could help.

The result was the start-up of the Brown Bag Program, sponsored by the Retirement and Care Center. Volunteers were helping to feed 30 of their neighbors back then. By this time last year, the number of recipients, “which has grown by word of mouth,” had reached 1945, said Lucchesi. Since then, nearly 300 additional people have stepped forward, asking for help.

On the volunteer side, what began as a few Mercy retirees serving in their immediate neighborhood has increased to 400 senior volunteers throughout Alameda County who help bag the food at 15 different sites.

The Alameda County Food Bank provides about two-thirds of the food. Some of the remaining food comes from Oroweat Bakery and Hope for the Heart. Each bag contains fresh produce, some protein such as peanut butter, beans, or canned tuna, as well as canned soup, canned vegetables and fruit, and fresh bread.

To be eligible as a Brown Bag recipient, a person must be over 60, with a single monthly income of $1,354 or a combined income of $2,192. Most recipients are seniors who receive Supplementary Security Income (SSI) and are not eligible for food stamps.

Janis Flippen, a communications person for Mercy, said that more seniors are now feeling the impact of the economic recession. According to Senior Services Coalition of Alameda County, over 54,000 aged, blind or disabled residents in Alameda County had their monthly SSI/SSP grants cut by at least $37 on May 1. An additional monthly cut of at least $20 occurred July 1.

Lucchesi said that Mercy remains “ever hopeful” that the Brown Bag program will be able to keep providing services at its present rate through foundation grants and individual donors. “We’ll just keep asking,” she said.

For information how to donate, contact Krista Lucchesi, at (510) 534-8547, ext. 369.

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