00:00I'm so thankful that she was able to come down and assist me because it's a lot of people who
00:21don't have the assistance and it's hard to try to depend on other people to help you. I'm such a
00:28very independent you know I try to help anybody else in need the best way I can and it's very hard
00:34for me to ask for help so when this came I said mom can you of course you know her answer without
00:39a doubt I'll come and help you and assist you but I'm thankful that I have this opportunity to be
00:44able to do this honestly speaking because we don't know what will happen within the next couple weeks
00:49month maybe within the next year. When she asked me there was no doubt I'm a substitute preschool
00:57teacher now I was a full-time preschool teacher for 18 years I've been subbing I'm going in my
01:03second year of subbing and we got here earlier and we parked to the side for about five ten minutes
01:09and she said no let's go back around when we came back around 50 almost 100 people were before us
01:17we're number 98 I said can you believe it we could have been number 50 something if we had
01:23there came right in but we said we'll wait you know give people an opportunity you know to get
01:29online and get their receivement of this nourishment so we weren't in a rush long as we're on the line
01:37we feel good. It's horrific what you know what's going on you know but thank God that even our country
01:45like Bergen County is doing this but it's awful you know well I still still know you may not put
01:53that in there I support President Trump and what's going on so let's get let's open up the government
01:58it's a clean bill. The problem is this is not going to be sustainable if this shutdown goes on for very
02:03long I mean this everything that we're spending right now is sort of over and above what we had
02:07budgeted for the year and so it's just really important that you know we sort of figure out a way
02:11to get people the help they need. We are so grateful to be partnering with the Community Food
02:15Bank in New Jersey to distribute to 2,000 families who are on SNAP or who are federally furloughed
02:21employees a box of fresh produce and a box of self-stable food to tide them through this really
02:27stressful and trying time you know there are it's estimated about 43,000 residents 25,499 households
02:35in Bergen County you know that are are on SNAP benefits that's what keeps me up at night that's what has
02:41been for the last three weeks as this has been a political football as we seem to be having
02:46inaction and this as a targeting our most vulnerable it's just devoid of humanity.
02:52I received a notice on October 1st around 6 in the morning letting me know that I was furloughed
03:03and they said obviously report do your shutdown operations and then you need to go home and you're
03:10not allowed to access your computers. I can't pay my bills. I don't know how to balance my bills because
03:16how long are we going to go determines how long my money will last. You know I'm struggling. My
03:23children are struggling. Our relationships are struggling. It's hard to balance everything. My
03:30daughter has a medication that she's on on a daily basis and I have to consider that and I have to
03:37worry about that too and how am I going to pay for the appointment and the medication and everything
03:44else and that's not a place a mom likes to be in so it's it's it's hard. Priorities are groceries.
03:53They're insurance. They're keeping a roof over their head. Keeping the lights on. Making sure those
04:00necessities are are taken care of but if this goes on much longer I don't know if we'll be able to continue
04:07that path.
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