A program to provide low-income people vouchers to buy fresh fruits and vegetables may see its county funding cut in half at the Board of Supervisors’ meeting today in Los Angeles.
L.A. County has to decide how to spend the second round of funding from the American Rescue Plan, and it has proposed spending $1 million for next year, down from the $2 million it allocated for the current fiscal year.
Frank Tamborello, executive director of Hunger Action Los Angeles, said the cuts would be counterproductive.
“It would basically undo a lot of the work that we’re now being able to do with the first phase of the funding,” Tamborello explained. “Which is to expand in some more truly needy areas and to also expand the program from just farmers’ markets to regular grocery stores and corner stores and things like that.”
The current funding allows tens of thousands of low-income families in L.A. County to use the Market Match program, which gives people who rely on CalFresh a dollar-for-dollar match, good at hundreds of farmer’s markets and other farm-direct sites across the state.
Tamborello hopes the county keeps the funding at $2 million a year, as an investment in people’s health.
“The county departments have long known that there’s a big disparity in the ability of low-income people to get healthy food,” Tamborello pointed out. “Which leads to poor outcomes in the long term, such as more cancer, higher rates of diabetes, and so on.”
As families feel the pinch of high inflation, advocates are bracing for cuts in the CalFresh benefits expected later this year. Other groups are calling on the county to reject the cuts, including the American Heart Association, the California Alliance of Boys and Girls Clubs, and a group called United Parents and Students.
Disclosure: Hunger Action Los Angeles contributes to our fund for reporting on Budget Policy and Priorities, Hunger/Food/Nutrition, Livable Wages/Working Families, and Poverty Issues. If you would like to help support news in the public interest, click here.
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September is National Hunger Action Month, and groups across Arkansas are part of a nationwide push to get more people involved with reducing food insecurity.
In North Little Rock, one is taking a unique approach to fighting hunger. More than 444,000 Arkansans are not always sure where their next meal is coming from, according to the nonprofit group Feeding America, and more than 138,000 of them are children.
Potluck Food Rescue wants to connect hungry Arkansans to good food which would otherwise be thrown out.
Sylvia Blain, executive director of the group, said 40% of the food produced in the United States goes to waste.
“We collect excess food from area restaurants, commercial kitchens and grocery stores, and other businesses that sell food, and we redistribute it to hunger relief agencies, free of charge, all over central Arkansas,” Blain outlined. “We currently distribute food in about six different counties.”
Blain estimated Potluck Food Rescue is diverting about 10,000 pounds of food a week which would otherwise end up in landfills. She pointed out reducing greenhouse-gas emissions from landfills is another side benefit, since every 100 pounds of food waste sends eight pounds of methane into the atmosphere as it decomposes.
Blain noted they have also seen an increase in the number of agencies they partner with. Prior to the pandemic, the group was distributing its “rescued” food to 19 different groups, and now, the number has increased to 56. She stressed the demand for food remains high.
“One in four people in Arkansas is hungry,” Blain reported. “That number has changed a bit. It’s gone up and down due to COVID. You know, we’re seeing rises in food prices, we’re seeing food shortages, and we expect that to go on for the next year or two, at least.”
Potluck Food Rescue is hosting a “Driving Away Hunger” fundraiser today in Little Rock, to educate the public about the food needs of the community.
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It’s that time of year when kitchens are bubbling over as home gardeners preserve their bounty. But there was a time when homegrown produce could be taken to a local cannery to be preserved.
After World War II, the U.S. had nearly 4,000 public canneries to help families save the produce from their “victory gardens,” promoted to counter wartime shortages.
Hannah Evans, director of Virginia Food Works, said the popular canneries were mostly located in Southern states and offered both practical and social benefits.
“If you can grow your own stuff, then the United States can focus their larger resources on the troops,” said Evans. “And so, a lot of them were based out of schools originally, so it would be part of the home economics programs at these schools, or the agricultural department programs.”
Only a handful of public canneries remain, and Evans said operational costs are the biggest factor.
Her nonprofit group partners with the Municipal Canning Facility in Prince Edward County to offer both commercial canning days, and also days for home canners to use the equipment.
Food Works pays the county for supplies and rent, and the county pays a small stipend to help support their work.
Infrastructure improvements at Virginia Food Works now allow the daily production of two-thousand glass jars of food from home growers and small businesses.
Evans admited it’s always interesting to hear people’s stories about why they use the cannery.
“People come and say, you know, ‘I have this recipe,'” said Evans. “Like either, ‘My friends have always told me it’s really good,’ or, ‘It was my grandmother’s and everyone’s always wanted me to bottle it and I’m trying to figure out how to make it a food business – help me.'”
While states such as California, Colorado, Michigan and Minnesota have the rare cannery, most that have survived since the 1940s are located in two states: Virginia – which has around 15 – and the Peach State of Georgia, which is home to nearly 30.
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September is Hunger Action Month, and experts say the issue of putting food on the table has never been more important, as families search for ways to get by with less amid inflation and flood-recovery efforts that continue in the eastern part of Kentucky.
Without a break in the rising costs of basic necessities, said Katrina Thompson, executive director of Feeding Kentucky, demand at food banks is expected to spike this fall.
“Families are finding themselves with not quite enough money to make it through the month,” she said, “so some of those families are finding themselves seeking services from the food banks that have never had to do that before.”
Kentucky has the ninth-highest rate in the nation of households considered food-insecure, and six Kentucky counties — Bell, Breathitt, Clay, Harlan, Magoffin and Wolfe — are on the list of 25 U.S. counties with the highest overall food-insecurity rates.
Next Wednesday, advocates will gather at the State Capitol to kick off Hunger Action Month activities, along with Gov. Andy Beshear and Kentucky Agriculture Commissioner Ryan Quarles. Thompson said flags on the Capitol lawn will symbolize the impact of hunger in the Commonwealth.
“Each of those signs will represent 500 people,” she said, “so that will show people how many people are hungry in Kentucky that don’t know where their next meal is coming from.”
She said donations, volunteering at your local food bank or working to raise awareness are all ways people can pitch in during Hunger Action Month.
Disclosure: Feeding Kentucky contributes to our fund for reporting on Hunger/Food/Nutrition, Poverty Issues. If you would like to help support news in the public interest, click here.
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