South Texas Is Running Out of Room on the Budget

In Alice, Beeville, and Rockport, the cost of getting through the month has gotten harder. Not because of one thing — because of several things arriving at the same time, each adding to a budget that didn't have a lot of room to begin with.

Gas is the most visible piece. Texas retail prices went from $2.46 a gallon in February to nearly $4 at the peak — a direct result of the U.S.-Israel war with Iran, which sent crude surging past $100 a barrel by threatening the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow passage that carries one in five barrels of global oil supply every day. Those prices aren't expected to come back down. ITEP calculates that households have already spent an average of $545 more on fuel since February, on track for $650 by end of summer. In communities where driving isn't optional — where there's no transit, no workaround — that $545 comes straight out of whatever else the budget was supposed to cover.

The grocery store hasn't offered any relief. At H-E-B in Alice, H-E-B in Beeville, and Walmart, prices have moved in the same direction as everything else. Ground beef is $6.90/lb, milk is $3.68/gallon, and eggs are $3.93/dozen. Every truck that restocks those shelves runs on diesel — and when fuel costs spike, transportation costs spike, and some of that lands on the price tag. Families already spending more at the pump are walking into a store that's also more expensive than it was six months ago.

Tariffs add a third layer that hits South Texas particularly directly. The 25% tariff on imports from Mexico applies to the avocados, tomatoes, peppers, limes, and cucumbers on the produce shelves at H-E-B and Walmart — food that, in many cases, crossed the Rio Grande not far from here. Federal Reserve researchers found that retailers pass the full cost of tariffs through to consumers. The tariff paid at the border shows up in the produce aisle, and South

Texas families are paying it alongside everyone else.

For households in Jim Wells County and Bee County, absorbing higher gas costs, higher grocery prices, and higher produce costs all at once isn't a budgeting challenge — it's a crisis. Food bank referrals across Texas are up 37% since February. That's not a separate story. It's where the gas and grocery numbers land when there's nothing left to absorb them.