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| Our Stories |
Community Stories
Board Member Stories Hunger Free Vermont focuses on developing and improving laws and regulations that effect the food delivery system. There are many organizations that are providing a safety net to hungry Vermonters but HFVT is the only organization that focuses on changing the system. Through the county hunger councils, HFVT informs and mobilizes local community members who have an interest and a stake in ensuring that hunger is eliminated in their communities. Councils provide members with information on the work others are doing in their county and provides a support system so they recognize they are not alone in their efforts. -Bob McNamara Hunger Council Member Stories
Letter to the Editor, submitted June 2010 There is a lot happening with food these days—nationally and in You can’t open a newspaper without reading about localvorism, farmer’s markets, community gardens, cooking classes, wine tastings, and what’s in season and how to prepare it. Our state is at the forefront of the nation’s food movement; And yet, the ugly truth is that people are hungry here. According to the last census, over 80,000 Vermonters lack consistent access to enough quality food. An estimated one in five households with children reporting running out of food.
Many children rely on school meals. Yet only one fifth of low-income children have access to meal programs during the summer, causing children to fall behind academically over the summer. We do even worse for our youngest children. The impact isn’t just falling on our kids. More than one in 10 seniors report going without food. Parents skimp, too, so they can provide food for their children. And, they may resort to poor quality, heavily processed food because it’s cheap and filling, setting the stage for family obesity, diabetes and other serious health issues. The solution for many hungry people has been food pantries and other charitable food programs. Local farms and restaurants are also providing admirable support. But rarely can those programs consistently provide the quality and quantity of food that so many need so badly. A better solution is to improve access to the federal nutrition programs that can feed children and seniors quality meals. However, those programs won’t work until they’re strongly supported at the highest levels of state government. We need our next governor to provide leadership and set the priority that Howard Dean made children’s health care a priority. Jim Douglas made the state’s economy a priority. I submit that eliminating hunger is both a health and economic issue, and that we can’t succeed in either enterprise until our population has enough to eat so that all are able to learn, work, innovate, contribute, volunteer, pass along our history, and rest with dignity. We can’t show people how to eat better when we let our neighbors go hungry. We lose our credibility. By not tackling the fundamental issue of hunger, we are stunting the growth of our state. We are shorting our brain trust across the entire age spectrum. We need to feed our kids so they can learn to become entrepreneurs, employees, parents, and strong contributors to our communities. We need to feed our seniors for all they’ve done for us and all they have to teach us. We need to feed our work force if we are going to have all those things we dream about – statewide high-speed internet access, clean and renewable energy, sustainable agriculture, an identity as the nation’s green enterprise center, and a leadership role in producing, preparing and appreciating high quality, locally produced food. To be leaders, we need leaders who understand the high costs, now and in the future, of hunger. Signed,
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3Squares helps my family immensely. I’m a single mom with two small children and receive about $500 a month. Food stamps ease the pressure of me having to decide between buying food or paying a utility. If my benefit is decreased then, I fear, I will go further into debt. I will 8-out-of-10 times feed my children before I pay a bill. Many Vermonters will do the same thing. Food is not a privilege or a right; it’s a NEED, a need that, even without the decrease in benefits, not everyone is receiving.
When I was a superintendent of schools, I observed great variance amongst schools in student participation in federal meals programs and huge disparities in the qualities of the meals being served. I was (and am) concerned that there is not student equity in meals programs. Whether you participate and the quality of the meals varies widely depending on the school you attend. Hunger Free Vermont focuses on issues that address these disparities.