On the first day that the Capital Area Food Bank started distributing free boxes of food to furloughed federal workers, October 21, a stark reality set in: “Within the first half hour, the line was twice as long as the food we had brought,” said Radha Muthiah, president and CEO of CAFB. The staff scrambled, increasing its 150 boxes to 370 that day to meet the need, and then doubled the amount brought to subsequent distributions that week—and, still, they ran short of food each time.

The current federal government shutdown, in which many civil servants are going unpaid, is just one more financial blow to many in the Washington, DC, region. DOGE layoffs, a federal takeover of DC that hurt some local businesses, and inflation in general have made it harder for many individuals to make ends m

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