|
 |
|
|
|
Stories from the Hotline:
Help After Disasters
The National Hunger Hotline (NHH), a service of WhyHunger's National Hunger Clearinghouse, provides real-time referrals for people in need across the U.S. to emergency food and assistance programs. The NHH is a portal to information, assistance, and resources, ultimately empowering families and individuals to meet their vital needs including fresh, healthy food. In Stories from the Hotline, we share some of the experiences of callers and our efforts to support them.
After a Federal Disaster Declaration in Michigan for severe storms and flooding, a caller from Garden City received the Hotline number from FEMA. She explained that she bought food, but there was a power outage for seven days and it had spoiled all the food in her fridge. She was able to get some help from her neighbors to purchase more food, but she wouldn't have money coming in until later in the month, so she needed assistance until then. She stated that she doesn't qualify for SNAP. The Hotline advocate was able to refer her to five food pantries in her area for immediate assistance.
The National Hunger Hotline 1-866-3 HUNGRY and 1-877-8 HAMBRE (1-866-348-6479 and 1-877-842-6273), refers people in need of emergency food assistance to food pantries, government programs, and model grassroots organizations that work to improve access to healthy, nutritious food and build self-reliance. Help is available on Monday through Friday from 9am-6pm EST. Hablamos espaņol. The Hotline is funded in part by the USDA Food and Nutrition Service.
|
|
|
|
 |
Survey: Emergency Food Providers and Advocacy
WhyHunger is deeply committed to supporting community groups develop lasting changes that reduce poverty and build community food security. We're also committed to supporting the emergence of grassroots leadership in the anti-hunger movement. To better understand the activities and nature of our partner organizations, we have developed a brief survey in collaboration with long-time colleague and former Community Food Security Coalition co-founder and Executive Director, Andy Fisher.
Please respond for one organization, for which you are a staff, Board member or participant. Your responses are anonymous. Survey results will be published in WhyHunger's Fall newsletter and in Andy Fisher's forthcoming book on the anti-hunger movement (to be published in 2015 or 2016). The survey is ten questions and should take no more than 5 minutes of your time. The deadline for your response is October 20th. Thanks for participating in this survey!
|
|
|
|
|
Closing the Hunger Gap: Cultivating Food Justice
Save the Date!
Hosted by: Oregon Food Bank and the Closing the Hunger Gap Network
About the Conference
Join food banks, farms, and organizations focused on health, education, and food justice for three days of critical discussion and action planning towards ending hunger and cultivating a more just food system.
Enjoy skill-building courses, engaging speakers, field trips to community food system innovators, and fantastic local food while sharing resources and making connections with anti-hunger and food justice advocates.
Details about the conference will be shared on Facebook and on the website.
|
|
Stories From Our Partners
|
|
Why Wages Matter in the Fight Against Hunger
The Hunger Action Network of New York State, a statewide membership organization that combines grassroots organizing at the local level with state level research, education and advocacy to address the root causes of hunger, including poverty, had their 32nd Annual Membership Conference in late September. The conversation was centered on hunger priorities in the coming year, namely living wages, affordable housing, and increased support for emergency food programs. The moderator, Ron Deutsch from New Yorkers for Fiscal Fairness, stated: "New York State is number one in income inequality in that the very wealthy are doing quite well, while the bottom 50% has been sliding backwards over the last decade."
The Executive Director of the Restaurant Opportunities Centers United - New York,
Daisy Chung, started off the economic justice workshop by talking about the important work that is being done at the Center. They organize restaurant workers to improve working conditions in the city in three ways:
1.) Direct organizing to fight illegal workplace practices (wage theft, discrimination, etc.)
2.) Engaging employers within the sector and promoting ethical workplaces.
3.) Research and policy work that engages workers to lift industry-wide standards.
The center is working on eliminating the "tip credit" which states that employers can deduct $3 from the minimum wage; this is why there are an estimated 230,000 tipped workers across the state that only receive a $2.13 minimum wage. Chung shed light on the alarming lack of benefits when it comes to women, people of color and undocumented workers. They are particularly impacted by no health insurance as well as a lack of vacation days, while still being overworked and underpaid. Ironically, people who work in foodservice are worried about nutrition, but are primarily concerned about earning enough money to feed their families.
An organizer from the Flushing Workers Center, a center led by immigrant low-wage workers, and the Justice Will Be Served Campaign, a coalition of workers that pushes for enforcement of labor laws, Sarah Ahn, supported Chung's statements by touching on the terrible working and living conditions that low-income workers deal with and how there is "no avenue for workers to fight back." Ahn then posed the question, "What is the magic number?" referring to what exactly is the number people are fighting for the minimum wage to be. Whether that number is fifteen dollars or not, the essential point of this workshop was that there has to be a strong fight for enforcement of wage laws connected to the fight for minimum wage. Workers need to know that they can ask for tips and thereby fight ongoing wage theft. The Justice Will Be Served Campaign is currently working on getting the SWEAT (Securing Wages Earned Against Theft) bill passed, which would go as far as having a law that would allow workers to freeze their employers' assets. Additionally, undocumented workers are a huge part of wage theft because of the vulnerable position they're in. They actually represent a majority of the workers that are speaking out about injustice even though they are "closer to the fire." Ahn emphasized that "when dealing with wage theft, people getting the lowest wage have the least political power. Their rights and interests are not taken into consideration; their needs are not reflected."
The fight against hunger will not end through food distribution alone. We need to support existing campaigns for living wages in order to help people get out of poverty. To learn more about this issue, see the the Families Out of Balance report from the Alliance for a Just Society, which includes a living wage study that examines what it takes to get by in ten states.
|
|
|
|
|
Nutrition Assistance In Farmers Markets: Understanding the Shopping Patterns of SNAP Participants
This study was undertaken to understand why some SNAP participants shop at farmers markets and others in the same geographic area do not. Results suggest that SNAP participants buy most of their fresh fruits and vegetables at farmers markets. Of those who shop at farmers markets, overall value including quality and price are major reasons for shopping at markets. Of those who do not, reasons for not shopping at farmers markets centered on convenience. Read more here.
|
|
|
|
|
Healthy Incentives Pilot: Final Evaluation Report
The Healthy Incentives Pilot (HIP) tested a way of making fruits and vegetables more affordable for participants in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). Under HIP, SNAP participants received a financial incentive for purchasing fruits and vegetables. The HIP evaluation used a random assignment research design. Specifically, 7,500 Hampden County SNAP households were randomly selected to participate in HIP, while the remaining 47,595 households continued to receive SNAP benefits as usual. The final evaluation report presents findings on the impacts of HIP on fruit and vegetable consumption and spending, the processes involved in implementation and operating HIP, impacts on stakeholders and the costs associated with the pilot. Read more here.
|
|
|
|
|
|
WhyHunger's Community Learning Project
At WhyHunger, one of our goals is to create a network of emergency food providers working towards community food security. One of our core approaches in the Nourish Project is the Community Learning Project (CLP), a one-year peer-to-peer learning exchange which facilitates knowledge and resource sharing and builds institutional capacity for emergency food providers in the community food security/food justice movement.
We know there is a growing group of emergency food providers around the country who are thinking about and taking action towards redefining their roles in addressing food insecurity in their communities. Is your organization thinking about and/or engaging in community food security work? Is there something you'd like to share with and learn from another organization? If so, we'd like to get to know you! If you are interested in participating in Nourish's Community Learning Project, tell us about your organization here. We are particularly interested in hearing from organizations addressing health and chronic disease management in low-income communities.
|
|
|
|
|
Letters From Our Readers
After reading the Helping Veterans Access Food story in the September issue, a reader from Oregon inquired if the caller was receiving SNAP. The caller had told the Hotline advocate that he had applied for SNAP and was waiting for his application to be processed, a detail we did not mention in the story.
After reading the What We're Reading Now: Racial Justice article, a reader from Illinois remarked that the article implies that "certain races are less capable." We're concerned that some people may have misunderstood the term "racial justice" and its meaning. Racial justice acknowledges that certain races have been historically disadvantaged and that there is structural oppression that has denied equal opportunities for everyone, which is directly connected to a disproportionate number of people of color experiencing hunger and poverty in the U.S. today. The resources in the article help clarify further, and we urge people to read them. We'd be happy to engage further with interested groups on this important dialogue.
|
|
|
|
|
|
Please verify that your organization's profile is accurate in the database. To update your record, email nhc@whyhunger.org. If your organization is not in the database, please join us here.
|
The Clearinghouse Connection is meant to encourage conversation and dialogue about transforming communities, community food security and the emergency food system. We want to hear from you! Email us at nhc@whyhunger.org.
|
National Hunger Clearinghouse
WhyHunger
505 Eighth Avenue, Suite 2100
New York, New York 10018
212-629-8850
|
Contributors: Betty Fermin and Jessica Powers.
|
|
|
