Foundation Journal

It's easy to get reports on how the crisis around the Federal government shutdown impacts workers and families in the Kansas City area. Major news outlets have reports that talk about whether this or that agency is shutting down and furloughing workers. Many of these reports feature personal, first-hand accounts of the impact on how workers are making ends meet. KKFI 90.1 FM, the local community radio station, got in on the act this week  with a report from a furloughed USDA worker. What's harder to determine is the impact on programs that provide benefits to poor people or low-income workers. The federally-funded Women, Infants and Children (WIC) feeding program seems to be safe for now, but will lose funding if the government stays closed for long. Thanks to the Springfield News-Leader and St. Joe News-Press for local reporting on the WIC story in Missouri. The story in the News-Leader was inconclusive whether the shutdown would exhaust WIC benefits in Greene County i...

The nation's first non-profit grocery store opened two days ago in St. Joseph , Missouri, narrowly beating Philabundance, the Philadelphia food bank, at selling food at discounted costs to low-income families. Actually, the claim of being the first non-grocery store could be debated, given the success of a mobile grocery store in Minnesota with 27 outlets that offers up to a 40% discount. Let's not quibble as Fresh Start, St. Joe's non-profit grocery store, starts this grand experiment because it's really about placing stores in or near " food deserts ." Putting aside food co-ops and similar ventures, it seems a bit of stretch to think that we had to wait until 2013 before someone came up with the notion of a non-profit grocery store. Shouldn't access to nutritious and affordable food be a basic right to everyone in one of the wealthiest nations of the world? You can bet there's going to be strong opposition to these efforts, especially i...

>A user-friendly website developed by Western Michigan University and the Federal government has surpassed 1 million users. The Food Research and Action Center reported that the "site helps low-income parents learn healthier child feeding behaviors, and has information available in English and Spanish. During the past year, more than 417,000 WIC clients used the site to access training videos, recipe lists, and lessons on topics like dealing with children who are picky eaters and how to improve meal nutrition." The site hosts a wealth of information and a variety of online tools, such as a YouTube video channel geared to WIC participants as shown here.

During a workshop at a food bank conference held October 3-5, 2011 in Chicago, David Lee, Director of Government Relations and Advocacy with Feeding America , acknowledged a “perfect storm” is brewing that could have a devastating impact on poor and working families. He was referring to the combination of continued, high unemployment, a significant increase in the need for food assistance, and proposed cuts in Federal support for food assistance programs. David Lee (photo: Feeding America) The proposed cuts to TEFAP (The Emergency Food Assistance Program) in the agriculture appropriations bill for FY2012, which starts October 1,  represent a 43% reduction from the previous year. “This is terrifying stuff,” mentioned Lee . The proposed House of Representatives version of the 2012 Farm Bill “slashed nutrition” by 20%,  he said, adding that this includes a “terrible, terrible cut to WIC,” the popular program available to lower-income pregnant women, breastfeeding women, ...