BATON ROUGE -- On September 30, both LSU and Southern AgCenter's SNAP-Ed programs will come to an end. It comes as a result of federal budget changes under the One Big Beautiful Bill signed on July 4.

"SNAP-Ed, that was funded at the federal level by the United States Department of Agriculture Food and Nutrition Service, so it's a comprehensive program that provides nutrition education to those who are eligible for food stamps or are receiving food stamps," LSU AgCenter Associate Professor Denise Holston said.

According to Holston, under the program's nutrition education realm, it teaches core concepts like healthy eating, food-dollar management so people can eat healthy on a limited budget, cooking skills, how parents can encourage their children to eat healthy on a limited budget, and what they call community improvements.

"What community improvements are, we call the PSEs. Policies, Systems, and Environmental changes, and those are small tweaks to a community that we can do that will make the healthy choice, the easy choice for those who live there. What that might look like is that we can support rural farmers' markets, we can support entire school wellness policies, we can support walking trails with millage and things like that," Holston said.

LSU AgCenter's SNAP-Ed program focuses on rural parishes that are considered food deserts.

"Our forty parishes are primarily rural, and so we really work in rural areas that have food deserts, which means not a lot of stores that may have healthy foods that are affordable; it's really challenging to meet your budget, whether you're on food stamps or not," Holston said.

Some of those parishes included Tangiaphoa and Assumption.

"We did have West Baton Rouge and Iberville, which is right now vacant because the program is closing," Holston said.

There is a lot of uncertainty among the LSU AgCenter as far as what will happen after the program ends later this month.

"We had a little less than 90 days to close out a 30-year program," Holston said.

"We're passionate about continuing to provide some level of support to these parishes that were previously covered by SNAP-Ed, but we don't know right now what that will practically look like," SNAP-Ed programmatic manager Jessica Randazzo said.

Randazzo says she was a nutrition and community health agent that was funded by SNAP-Ed in St. Mary and St. Martin parishes for about seven years.

One of the things she did was work with schools to put on garden-based nutrition lessons. She says that through SNAP-Ed, they could help fund those gardens, which she says is usually a major barrier for these school gardens.

"I worked with a group of elementary school kids, and there was one student in particular who, for some reason, was in the garden club but didn't want to get dirty. He didn't want to try vegetables, but throughout the year, we worked on it, and he not only was willing to try vegetables, but he found ones that he liked, and he became a leader amongst his peers," Randazzo said.

WBRZ reached out to Southern AgCenter for comment, but has not heard back.

However, their SNAP-Ed program did make a post on Facebook recently saying "SNAP-Ed at the Southern University Ag Center has stood as a cornerstone of service, empowering Louisiana residents with the tools, skills, and knowledge needed to make healthier choices and lead more active lives. The program has reached communities large and small through innovative outreach strategies such as The Food for Thought Podcast, Facebook Live sessions, engaging nutrition classes, visual learning tools, and youth-based initiatives, including C.H.E.R.R.Y. Pick and C.H.E.F. Camp. These efforts have touched countless lives, leaving a lasting imprint on individuals, families, and entire communities across the state."

According to LSU, the Southern AgCenter focuses on East Baton Rouge and a lot of urban areas like Lafayette.