One of the things I’ve come to appreciate about living and working in Tompkins County is how quickly people from completely different corners of the community can come together when there’s a problem that needs solving.
Over the past year, I’ve had the opportunity to experience that firsthand as part of the local SNAP Working Group. My role eventually included something I know pretty well: using video to tell a complicated story in a way that hopefully makes it a little easier to understand.
The result was a three-part video series about changes to SNAP, how our community is responding and what local organizations can do to help.
Getting Involved With the SNAP Working Group
The SNAP Working Group came together in November 2025 after Cindy Wilcox, Executive Director of the Human Services Coalition of Tompkins County, and local partners began discussing how upcoming federal changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program could affect people locally.
It quickly grew beyond one or two organizations.
The group brought together people from nonprofits, social services, health, food access, workforce development and other parts of the community. As one participant described it in the video series, people were essentially “working out loud,” asking difficult questions and figuring out how to keep people from falling through the cracks.
That collaborative aspect is what I enjoyed most about participating in the group.
There were a lot of different perspectives around the table and nobody had the entire solution themselves. The whole point was to put those perspectives together.
Why the SNAP Changes Matter Locally
The federal policy changes expand SNAP work requirements for Able-Bodied Adults Without Dependents, commonly referred to as ABAWDs. More SNAP recipients may now be required to work or participate in other allowable activities to maintain benefits beyond the applicable time limit. There are still exemptions, however, and individual circumstances vary, which is why Tompkins County encourages people to contact the Department of Social Services about their specific situation.
During the interviews for the first video, I heard about the possible effects from several different perspectives.
Food access organizations are preparing for the possibility of more people using local pantries. Human service professionals talked about the ripple effect food insecurity can have on transportation, health, childcare and entire households. Others talked about something even more basic: the mental strain of not knowing where your next meal is coming from.
Turning the Working Group Into a Video Series
This is where my role with my video and digital marketing experience really came into play.
I filmed and produced a three-part series featuring local professionals working in human services, food access, public health and community organizations.
The first video focuses on what is changing with SNAP, who may be affected and what those changes could mean for our community.
The second video was probably my favorite from a storytelling perspective because it focuses on the SNAP Working Group itself. It shows how people who may not normally work directly with one another ended up in the same room trying to solve a common problem.
The third video takes things from talking about the problem to doing something about it.
A big part of the community response was the development of Tompkins-Opportunity.org, an online platform where folks can find volunteer, training and employment opportunities and organizations can post opportunities of their own.
That matters because qualifying activities can potentially help some people meet SNAP work requirements. The video explains how businesses and nonprofits can help by creating flexible volunteer opportunities, clearly communicating expectations and being prepared to track and verify participation.
The more organizations that participate, the more options people have to find something that works with their individual circumstances.
More Than Just Making Videos
I’ve made a lot of videos over the years. Music videos, cowboy boot videos, apartment tours, promotional videos, interviews and all sorts of weird stuff in between. This project was a little different from those.
I wasn’t just showing up after everything had already happened to document it. I had the opportunity to participate in the working group, listen to the conversations, see the collaboration develop, understand what was happening and then use my skills to help communicate what the group was doing.
The finished videos feature voices from throughout Tompkins County, including people working directly with SNAP recipients and people thinking about the broader effects on food access and community services. The County described the project as an effort to make the changes easier to understand while connecting residents with resources and opportunities.
While it will take some time to get the exact numbers in how many folks we were able to help with the SNAP Working Group, the initial data is promising and it looks as though we made a real difference.