Food Insecurity in Jefferson County 🍎

In conjunction with The Fund for Healthier Colorado, Open Answer spent some of our summer surveying Jefferson County residents about their access to food and their experiences with food insecurity. We also connected respondents to resources like MyFriendBen which allows users to check their eligibility for a variety of government programs.

Although our survey did not ask about federal politics or international trade, the topics invariably came up when respondents spoke about the rising cost of food. We found that while not all respondents were aware of the recently passed federal budget cuts, those who were are very nervous, and respondents across the board are concerned about tariffs.

What challenges, if any, do you face in getting enough food?

Jefferson County residents' responses to a multiple choice question about barriers to food access.

This survey was administered in both English and Spanish with our bilingual canvassers, and while the themes of the responses to this question were largely the same among English and Spanish-language respondents, the largest gap was around stigma. As a percentage of responses by language, stigma around asking for help was cited over three times as frequently among Spanish-language respondents as compared with their English-language counterparts. This was not the focus of the survey but is important data to have for organizations seeking to serve bilingual and monolingual Spanish speaking communities in the region.