Social Services Outreach

Fact Sheet
Social Services Outreach

Program Overview
The Houston Food Bank is focused on raising awareness in the 18-county service area of available social services and providing application assistance for state-funded social and health services. Regarding food stamps, currently in Texas there are 532,000 people eligible, but only 291,000 (55%) actually receive food stamps.

The program provides “hassle-free” sign-up for application assistance via phone or home visit, assistance in making copies of necessary documents.  The Houston Food Bank also goes into communities via churches and community centers and public events such as health fairs, food fairs and other community gatherings, to set-up awareness and application-assistance centers. By attending these various community gatherings, we are able to distribute information on such vital programs, such as, Texas Medicaid, Children’s Medicaid, Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), Food stamps, Texas Medicaid Women’s Health Program, CHIP Perinatal Program, and many other social services.

While this program does not determine an individual’s eligibility, it ensures they have information on the assistance programs, confirms that the necessary paperwork is completed thoroughly and correctly, and can even submit the paperwork on an applicant’s behalf.

This program was launched statewide through the Texas Food Bank Network Association and the Health and Human Services Commission.

Since this programs inception, a total of 194 applications have been processed and 2,718 contacts have been made through Outreach from October 2006-June 2007.

Contact:
April Hatch
Social Services Outreach Program Coordinator
713-547-8672
ahatch@houstonfoodbank.org 

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