Food bank organizers in the Tri-Cities said their reserves have been depleted as more families seek free meals, a development that worries officials ahead of a funding reduction to the state food assistance program that could drive demand even further.

Almost 400 families in Benton and Franklin counties were set to lose half their food stamp benefits starting Sunday under a plan to save money in the state budget, the Tri-City Herald reported Saturday (http://bit.ly/MhzVYY).

John Wiley, a spokesman for the Department of Social and Health Services, told the Herald that the Food Assistance for Legal Immigrants Program, known as FAP, is a state-funded program for low-income people who are legal residents of the United States but haven't lived here long enough to qualify for federal food stamps.

Legal residents with green cards have to live in the U.S. for five years to qualify for the federal program, according to eligibility requirements.

The state-funded program has 370 households enrolled in Benton and Franklin counties. That will be cut in half starting Sunday when reductions for the 2012-13 budget year go into effect.

John Neill, executive director of the agency that operates food banks in Kennewick, Richland and Benton City, expects that will mean more people in line at the food banks.

"It's obvious the effect it's going to have on us," he said.

People in the food stamp programs already make up part of the Tri-Cities Food Banks' clientele, usually when their benefits start to run out toward the end of the month, Neill said.

"By the third week of the month they're depleted and they come to us in droves," he said.

On Tuesday, the Kennewick food bank served 112 families and the Richland food bank served 70 families.

"That's holiday volume," Neill said. "That's the kind of volume we have the day before Thanksgiving or right before Christmas. With no food coming through the door and no food drives going on, that kind of volume depletes us."

With benefits for those households on FAP reduced by half, chances are they'll come in earlier - and the problem is that while demand has remained high, donations haven't kept up.

"Even the volunteers are starting to remark about it, saying, `What are we going to do?'" Neill said. "I spent all afternoon talking to people who could put a food drive together or write us a check. It's getting to the point where we're using all our available cash to buy food right now because there is no food coming through the doors."

And food prices have increased along with gas prices, so dollars don't stretch quite as far, and grocery stores are controlling inventory more tightly so there are fewer leftovers to give to food banks, he said.