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Author: David Lee

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David Lee

John Stuligross
Natalie Mepham
Elizabeth Macpherson

Lisa Williams
Stephanie Jung Dorfman
Stephanie Harte, Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin
De'Kendrea Stamps
Sophia Stingl
Maureen Fitzgerald, Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin
Cecelia Schieve
David Pluymers
Kris Tazelaar

David Lee says Good Bye

Posted by David Lee in on May 4, 2019 Tagged:

Last month, I wrote our board directors that I would be leaving Feeding Wisconsin to start a new adventure as the inaugural CEO of ImagineMKE, a start-up arts advocacy coalition with a vision of creating a thriving, vibrant, and inspired Milwaukee through a world class arts and culture sector. Up until this opportunity found me, I had thought that leaving Feeding Wisconsin was an impossibility, but this new role at ImagineMKE brings together my non-profit leadership with my lifelong passion for the arts.

This job was the unicorn that I could not pass up chasing.

But of course this means leaving this organization and our work fighting hunger together. As Feeding Wisconsin's founding Executive Director, this gives me all of the feels. At the same time, it gives me unique perspective on where we came from, where we are today, and where we can go in the future.

We have grown the state office of food banks from an initial $100,000 seed investment from UnitedHealthcare to an organization of $1.4 million as of our last 990. That's over 10x growth in just over 4 years and the vast majority of those revenues have been reinvested into our food banks and food pantries to increase their capacity to source and distribute fresh, healthy, and nutritious food, improve their ability to fight child hunger, and importantly, to increase access to FoodShare benefits for our friends and neighbors living throughout the state.

We have provided a strong voice in Madison and in DC to ensure that we could hold the line on important public benefits and to promote effective bipartisan solutions to hunger. In fact, we played a key role in passing a "no-harm" Farm Bill last year in an incredibly divisive political landscape.

We have held trainings across the state, including our annual and rapidly growing statewide summit on Hunger and Health that brings together hunger fighters, health champions, food advocates, and community builders from across the state to network, share best practices, and improve their capability to fight hunger, improve health, and strengthen communities.

And we've done this all with a small band of merry hunger fighters that I am so proud to have been a part of and have had the opportunity to lead. While the faces have changed over the years - John Stuligross, Maureen Pauly-Hubbard, Elizabeth MacPherson, Natalie Mepham, Katlyn Panka, and Kimball Banwell - we have always done our work with urgency, excellence, and integrity. I know that these values, passion, and commitment will be carried forward by the next leader of Feeding Wisconsin, who with our incomparable current team of Steph Dorfman, Amanda Keenan, and Pha Vang, will have an incredible opportunity to shape our way forward toward a healthy and hunger-free Wisconsin.

Most of all, the new leader at Feeding Wisconsin will have you.

You, who have wrote and called your legislators about Harvest for Hope and the Farm Bill and Child Nutrition Reauthorization, and who have stayed late to testify at the State Capitol, and who have endured long days on Capitol Hill for lobby meetings;

You, who have invited us into your communities and let us into your food pantries and meal programs to learn from you and your clients;

You, who have taken the time to present and speak at our trainings and conferences or who have attended our trainings and conferences and who brought home a new connection or way of working that strengthened your community;

You, who have heeded the call to volunteer, donate, and support our member food banks.

With you, my successor at Feeding Wisconsin and the staff will have all they need to build and expand on our work over the first five years of our existence.

One of my first lessons coming into the work as a professional hunger fighter over ten years ago was the we have more than enough food and resources in this country to make sure that everybody has enough to eat. Of all of the big, hairy social problems that face our country, hunger can be the most easily solved through a combination of more robust and innovative private charity and a more robust social safety net.

I still believe this. More so today than ten years ago and I am looking forward to seeing the new vision and vigor that my successor will bring to this work and how she or he will inspire our board of directors, advisory committee, staff, and you to make real progress toward a healthy and hunger-free Wisconsin.

There's a little Easter egg on our site that only a few people have seen. It's a video of me thanking the viewer for signing up for our Hunger Fighter program through a very specific link. And as I have reflected on my feelings about closing this chapter in my professional career, the sentiment expressed in that video pretty much nails it.

Again, thank you.

As ever, I wish you all good things,
David

Fight Hunger, Spark Change

Posted by David Lee in on May 1, 2019 Tagged:

We are in the home stretch of Walmart's sixth annual nationwide "Fight Hunger. Spark Change." where you can join forces with Walmart, Sam's Clubs, and many participating food companies to help our food banks fight hunger locally.

For the next week, make sure you stock up on the nearly 270 participating products from 18 great brands that you buy every day, including Bush Brothers, Campbell’s, Con-Agra Brands, Cliff Bar, General Mills, Gold Peak Tea, Great Value, Hidden Valley, JM Smucker, Kellogg, Kraft Heinz, McCormick, Motts, PepsiCo, Post, Uncle Ben’s, Nature Nate’s Honey and Unilever, as each purchase at a Walmart or Sam's Club will unlock a donation to your local food bank.

You can donate to your local Feeding America member food bank at the registers of Walmart and Sam's Club stores. Donations of $1, $2, $5 or another amount will be accepted. There is no limit to what can be raised at the register! 100% of funds will be directed to local member food banks.

100% of funds raised through in-store purchases will benefit local member food banks. Donations will be localized based on where each item is sold, so you can be sure that hunger fighting resources unlocked by your purchases stay in your community.

To support the Fight Hunger. Spark Change. campaign and to raise awareness about the issue and the different facets of how we fight hunger and spark change, Second Harvest Foodbank of Southern Wisconsin, our food bank in Madison, has produced a limited series podcast fittingly called, "The Fight Hunger Spark Change Podcast."

The first episode features a coordinator from a school pantry in the Wisconsin Dells, the second episode is with our Executive Director, and the third episode highlights a senior who visits the mobile pantry in Portage, Wisconsin. While all episodes are worth listening to, the third episode is a must-listen.

The podcast features just a small sliver of all of the people that the Fight Hunger. Spark Change. campaign helps and supports locally and nationwide. In fact, since its inception, Fight Hunger. Spark Change. has helped secure the equivalent of 749 million meals and we hope that with your help in this last week, we can reach a cumulative national goal of one billion meals by the time this year's campaign ends on May 20, 2019.

You can learn more here.

Capitol Hill Visits 2019

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 3, 2019 Tagged:

On Monday and Tuesday, we were on Capitol Hill for our annual DC trip and congressional visits as part of the National Anti-Hunger Policy Conference sponsored by Feeding America, FRAC, and the National CACFP Forum. We were joined by our hunger fighting friends at WISCAP, the Wisconsin Council on Churches, and representatives from our food bank Second Harvest Foodbank of Southern Wisconsin.

It was great to be able to touch base with all of our members of Congress to discuss our legislative priorities for the year and share some of our concerns about current issues that would increase the risk of hunger for our friends and neighbors.

We discussed the rule making at USDA that would limit the flexibility of states to tailor SNAP through the waiver process to meed the needs of the local employment conditions and shared our public comment letter on the issue. You can submit a public comment to USDA here.

We reported on the great opportunities of all of the new food coming through the TEFAP program and the trade mitigation program (TMP), but also some of the challenges that WISCAP has faced in administering the program and that we have faced as a partner distributing the added surplus from the TMP products.

We also shared some promising policy proposals to expand EITC to single adults and to make the Child Care Tax Credit fully refundable. These proposals have been proposed in both nonpartisan and bipartisan working groups and they would increase the money that our friends and neighbors with low-incomes have at their disposal.

While we were able to fly to DC to meet with our elected officials face to face, you don't have to in order to have the same impact (though you might run into former LG Rebecca Kleefisch, like we did). According to a 10-year Congressional Management Foundation study, direct constituent contact is the most effective in shaping the views of legislators. Making phones ring is great but emails are good too.

You can use our Elected Official locator to find the contact information of your federal, state or local elected official to tell them about the importance of fighting hunger, improving health, and strengthening communities where you live, work, and play.

Decrease in the FoodShare Program in SOTU

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 3, 2019 Tagged:

Last night during the State of the Union address, the President said, “Nearly 5 million Americans have been lifted off food stamps," as an example of the improving economy.

This is a great example of why SNAP must be protected and why it was so important that the recently passed Farm Bill did not make any structural changes to the program. A primary feature of the program is that it expands when the economy is bad and the need is high, just like in 2008, and when the economy improves, the program contracts, as people "graduate" from the program as they make more money and get back on their feet.

It is encouraging that SNAP participation has decreased by almost 4 million people between Sept 2017 – Sept 2018. The trend of people leaving the program started in 2014, when the larger economic recovery began reaching many of the people working lower wage jobs.

However, it’s important to remember that some states, including Wisconsin have rolled back waivers and increased time-limits for some of the hardest to reach populations, like single-adults without children.

This means that there are hundreds of thousands of people – including over 84,000 in Wisconsin - who no longer qualify for the program, and who have lost benefits, despite still being at or below the poverty line. Anecdotal reports also suggest that immigrant families are dropping out of the program due to uncertainty and fear of immigration policies.

Government Shutdown

Posted by David Lee in on Jan 2, 2019 Tagged:

The shutdown of the federal government is heading into its fourth week, with no end in sight. Over 800,000 federal workers, including nearly 29,000 living in Wisconsin, are furloughed or working without pay.

We are concerned on two fronts about a prolonged government shutdown. The first, of course, is that 29,000 federal employees living in Wisconsin, working hard and playing by the rules, are currently not receiving paychecks. While the government is shutdown and the paychecks have stopped, the need for food and to pay the mortgage and other bills continue.

The challenges and uncertainties that these federal workers are now facing are just like the challenges that many of our friends and neighbors face when they are not earning enough money or working enough hours due to no fault of their own.

As with any unexpected local disruption like a flood or the closure of a local business, our network of six regional food banks and over 1,000 local food pantries is ready to help anyone who is in need of food. Anyone in need of help should call 211 to be directed to local food pantries or to other services and benefits that they may be eligible for.

The second front we are concerned about is how an extended government shutdown will affect federal nutrition programs, specifically FoodShare (SNAP, formerly food stamps). The FoodShare benefit is funded through the federal government and while USDA has announced that the benefit will be funded through February, it is unclear if there will be money for this vital nutrition assistance benefit if the shutdown extends into March.

Thanks to the incredible generosity of our network's many donors, partners, and volunteers, our food banks work to meet the needs of Wisconsinites at-risk of hunger and while we are able to absorb a short-term increase in need on the scale of 30,000 people, absorbing the need of nearly 600,000 FoodShare recipients will be a challenge. For example, our network of food banks distributed about $90 million worth of food in Wisconsin in 2016; FoodShare provides about $70 million in grocery benefits in our state every month.

We of course hope that it does not come to that. In the meantime, we call on our elected officials to work together to find a pathway forward through this impasse and get the government - and our friends and neighbors committed to strengthening our communities through public service - working again.

You can add your voice by writing your elected officials here.

FoodShare During the Shutdown

Posted by David Lee in on Jan 1, 2019 Tagged:

The good news is that USDA recently announced that it would pay February FoodShare benefits!

The bad news is that we don't know a whole lot more about what happens after that.

In the meantime, here's what we do know about FoodShare benefits during the shutdown:

February FoodShare benefits will be loaded early, likely by or around January 20th. This means that if your normal disbursement day is the 15th of the month, you will receive your January benefit on January 15th and your February benefit about a week later.
FoodShare clients should check benefit balance around the 20th to make sure that the benefit has arrived. This is an early issuance of the normal February monthly benefit amount, not an extra benefit. FoodShare benefits will NOT be put on QUEST cards in February.
Households should plan and budget their FoodShare benefits accordingly. They can use them at their leisure and not be worried about those benefits on their card going away due to the shutdown.
New FoodShare applications are still being taken and we are still learning about how our state agency will be processing and handling these applications under federal law.

If you need help with your FoodShare case, with a new case, or if you have any questions about FoodShare, our FoodShare Helpline can help you. Please call our friendly and awesome staff at 1-877-366-3635.

If you are interested in telling your story about how the shutdown has affected you, please do not hesitate to reach out to us at fighthunger [at] hungerfreewisconsin.org or you can us our FoodShare storybank form here.

We passed the Farm Bill!

Posted by David Lee in on Dec 4, 2018 Tagged:

Incredible. We did it.

After two years of consideration, the House of Representatives and the Senate passed the Conference Report for the 2018 Farm Bill.

Most importantly, the Farm Bill Conference Report protects funding and access to SNAP and increases funding for The Emergency Food Assistance Program by $206 million over ten years. The bill also provides helpful changes to many other provisions in nutrition programs like establishing a modest Farm to Food Bank Program to support connecting excess food produced with food banks, and investments in SNAP Employment and Training pilots.

Reaching out to thank elected officials is an important part of the advocacy process. Please take a moment to share your thanks or concern with your members of Congress about their votes on the Farm Bill.

Despite the recently passed limitations in SNAP/FoodShare access in our state, this bipartisan Farm Bill is still an incredible win for our friends and neighbors at-risk of hunger in Wisconsin and throughout the nation. It provides peace of mind to those who are food insecure that nutrition programs will be there when they need assistance, and also gives certainty to other key constituencies of the Farm Bill such as growers and producers.

We look forward to your partnership as we continue to work on improving SNAP/FoodShare access here in Wisconsin. If this Farm Bill proves anything, it's that with our voices speaking together, we can ensure that important programs like SNAP stay strong for our friends and families that need them.

Let's Pass a Farm Bill!

Posted by David Lee in on Dec 2, 2018 Tagged:

The 2018 Farm Bill conference report was released on Monday and it contained none of the harsh changes to SNAP that we, and many other hunger-relief advocates, have been holding the line on. Rather, it hews closely to the SNAP policies set forth in the Senate version of the Farm Bill which helps to improve SNAP without structurally changing the program.

This is incredible news as it sets up two votes this week in the House and Senate to finally pass a strong, bipartisan 2018 Farm Bill!

We are expecting the House to vote on the conference Farm Bill report on Wednesday and then the Senate to vote on it by Friday or early next week.

This means that we are at the goal line for the 2018 Farm Bill and we need your help to help push us over the line. Please reach out to your members of Congress today to let them know that you support the Farm Bill conference report and that you want them to vote for its passage.

12/11 Update

The Senate jumped the House and voted to pass the Farm Bill Conference report on a largely bipartisan basis on Tuesday. The vote was 87-13. Senator Baldwin voted yes and Senator Johnson voted no. The House is slated to vote on the report on Wednesday or Thursday. Please keep reaching out to your Members!

Meeting Clients

Posted by David Lee in on Nov 5, 2018 Tagged:

Over the last few months, we have been traveling the state and speaking with food pantry clients to better understand their food and health needs.

Wisconsin REALTORS fight child hunger

Posted by David Lee in on Sep 1, 2018 Tagged:

The Wisconsin REALTORS Association Foundation board and staff celebrated Hunger Action Month with us today by launching their multi-year campaign to fight child hunger in Wisconsin with a $50,000 gift to stock our six food banks and 1,000-plus food pantries throughout the state.

The Foundation continue to engage their members in additional fundraising and organizing local REALTOR® volunteers to fight child hunger in their local communities. With over 16,000 REALTORS® in every corner of the state, the Foundation hopes to mobilize them to help food pantries bridge “the last mile” and deliver the food to needy families.

“We are committed to helping children in need throughout Wisconsin and our partnership with Feeding Wisconsin will help us achieve that goal, one family, one meal and one child at a time,” said WRF Chairman Mike Spranger, a broker with First Weber REALTORS® of Wisconsin Rapids.

With our food banks' high efficiency, $7 can provide up to three meals a day for a week.

After the check presentation, foundation staff and board volunteered at Second Foodbank of Southern Wisconsin to sort thousands of pounds of frozen pizzas to get them ready for distribution later this week.

#ProducePalooza

Posted by David Lee in on Jul 4, 2018 Tagged:

Incredible.

in 2013, UnitedHealthcare provide the initial seed investment to get Feeding Wisconsin off the ground.

Yesterday, hundreds of UnitedHealthcare employees volunteered at our food banks across the state to help celebrate UnitedHealthcare's incredible $700,000 gift to Feeding Wisconsin to help our network of food banks and food pantries improve our collective ability to source, store, and distribute more fresh produce.

This incredible partnership has given us opportunity to work together, across the state, on the same day at the same time to advance not only our mission of fighting hunger, improving health, and strengthening communities, but also UnitedHealthcare’s mission of helping people live healthier lives and making the health system better for everyone.

I often talk about our collective strength as a network of food banks but yesterday, I really felt it.

It was incredible.

Together, across the four sites, UnitedHealthcare employees sorted 41,055 pounds of apples, cabbages, pears, potatoes, onions, and other fresh produce products that will be distributed to food pantries this week. That’s about 47,000 daily servings of produce for our friends and neighbors around the state.

A Tale of Two Farm Bills

Posted by David Lee in on Jun 5, 2018 Tagged:

The Senate passed its version of the Farm Bill yesterday on a strong, bipartisan vote. This sets up a conference between the Senate and the House, which narrowly passed its version of the Farm Bill just last week, to hash out the differences between the two versions. Both chambers will have to pass the conformed Farm Bill coming out of conference before the President can sign it into law.

Given the vast differences in SNAP policy between the two versions, this may be a difficult task.

The Senate version, which Feeding Wisconsin supports, would improve SNAP and strengthen its accountability and workforce development features without risking access to basic nutrition assistance for vulnerable Americans. It also invests in fighting hunger and improving health by establishing innovative pilots aimed at increasing access and consumption of fresh produce by low-income Americans dealing with diet related diseases. This is work that many of our food banks are already engaged with in local communities.

The House version of the Farm Bill would make sweeping changes to SNAP, resulting in indiscriminate cuts, arbitrary time-limits and rollbacks in eligibility for up to 7 million Americans. According to our internal estimates, it would reduce access to at least 150 million meals, increasing the risk of hunger for tens of thousands of Wisconsin families, seniors, and children.

While we are encouraged by the strong bipartisan support of the Senate Farm Bill, we remain concerned that some of the extreme policy positions in the House Farm Bill may survive the conference to be included the final Farm Bill.

The Senate Farm Bill, which charts a forward looking vision to fight hunger, improve health and strengthen communities, is the right approach to the Farm Bill.

You can learn more about the two Farm Bills and take action here.

Senate Ag Committee Passes Bipartisan Farm Bill

Posted by David Lee in on Jun 3, 2018 Tagged:

We join a broad coalition of food, farm, and anti-hunger advocates to applaud the Senate Agriculture Committee’s bipartisan passage of The Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018 (S.3042). This legislation presents a forward-looking vision to fight hunger, improve health and strengthen our rural communities.

Unlike the House version, the Senate Farm Bill makes responsible, common-sense investments in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), our nation’s signature anti-hunger program to improve SNAP’s integrity, accountability and workforce development features without risking access to basic nutrition assistance for vulnerable Americans.

While the Senate Farm Bill does a great job in protecting SNAP, it misses an opportunity to fully invest in The Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP), which provides high-quality food products for food banks and food pantries to distribute to Americans at-risk of hunger. TEFAP is a significant source fruits, vegetables, protein and dairy purchased from U.S. growers and producers. Over one-third of food insecure Wisconsinites earn too much to be eligible for SNAP. For many of them, they rely on the Wisconsin’s food banks and food pantries for help.

We remain hopeful that there will be opportunities to increase investment in TEFAP as the bill moves to the Senate floor. We are also very excited about the proposed pilot projects that would help connect low-income Americans at-risk of diet-related diseases to healthy food. Most importantly, we grateful that the Senate Farm Bill protects SNAP.

You can take action by clicking here to urge Senators Baldwin and Johnson to continue working in a bipartisan manner to protect SNAP as the Farm Bill moves toward a full vote and urge your Representative to follow the Senate’s lead when it revisits HR 2.

Let's rally for a Farm Bill that fights hunger, not one like H.R. 2, which would increase it!

Posted by David Lee in on May 3, 2018 Tagged:

Wisconsinites are tough and hard working. It’s in our character. Every day, we get up and get ourselves to work, get our kids to school, and take care of our friends, family and community. For many of us, we are fortunate to have enough money to get the food and nutrition we need to fuel us through the day. However, this isn’t true for nearly 700,000 of our friends and neighbors, who are working hard to make their ends meet but just come up a bit short. The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, also known as FoodShare in Wisconsin) works in concert with local food banks and pantries to help many Wisconsin families close this gap.

As many of you know, the Farm Bill is the legislative vehicle that authorizes and funds SNAP. It is up for renewal this year and unfortunately, the House of Representatives is currently considering the passage of a Farm Bill (H.R. 2) that would indiscriminately cut SNAP benefits and make it harder for seniors, children and working families to get the food they need to work, learn and live healthy lives. These cuts would widen the gap that low-income Wisconsin families experience every month.

SNAP is an important program that helps people living in households with an annual net income at or below $20,400 with a modest monthly benefit to buy groceries. In Wisconsin, the program helps over 325,000 families, including almost 300,000 children, and the average monthly benefit is about $120 per person per month. Over two-thirds of SNAP recipients in Wisconsin are children and the elderly, blind and disabled, and of the remaining third, a majority of those adults are working, they just don’t have enough hours or make enough money.

Despite the heated political rhetoric about the program, SNAP works at accomplishing its core mission: provide nutrition assistance to low-income Americans. It is highly efficient and has a low rate of program fraud.

Yet, we believe that there are many opportunities to improve SNAP and applaud that H.R. 2 makes some of these reforms, such expanded income deductions and exclusions, which help to modestly improve the benefit calculation.

However, these incremental improvements do not make up for the deep, structural program changes that are being proposed that would radically alter the way the program is operated, take away state flexibility to tailor the program to suit local needs, and cut nutrition benefits to hard working families who are just on the edge of making it out of poverty.

For example, right now, low-income Americans that qualify and receive benefits from a means-tested program can be “categorically eligible” for SNAP. One of the best examples of this is that children living in families that receive SNAP are also eligible for free or reduced-price school lunch. Because the child is living in a household that is qualified for SNAP, and therefore low-income, schools can seamlessly ensure that these kids have access to school meals.

This kind of program coordination reduces duplicative program administrative costs and unnecessary red-tape, and is an example of how government programs should work.

Unfortunately, H.R. 2 would roll back categorical eligibility and in Wisconsin, that would mean that over 75,000 Wisconsinites would lose SNAP eligibility, including almost 25,000 children, who would also lose their eligibility for school meals.

In sum, H.R. 2 would cut over $17 billion in benefits from working families, seniors, and children and divert nearly $7 billion of those cut benefit dollars into a creating a large government bureaucracy to monitor and enforce compliance with an expanded work requirement.

While we agree that a good job is best anti-hunger tool, it’s important to remember that SNAP is a nutrition program, not a jobs program. Effective work and training programs cost on average $7,500 per participant. H.R. 2 would provide only $30 per participant.

With the improving economy, SNAP participation is already on the decline. Congress should not pass a Farm Bill like H.R. 2, which cuts benefits, increases government bureaucracy and breaks the promise that we have made as Americans to provide a basic amount of nutrition assistance to people experiencing a temporary tough time.

The House of Representatives will likely be voting this week on H.R. 2. Please take a moment to email and call your Representative to let them know that the Farm Bill should fight hunger and reduce food insecurity by strengthening SNAP, not the other way around.

Take Action here.

Harvest for Hope Passes Senate Ag & is Set for the Assembly Floor!

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 3, 2018 Tagged:

For the last four years, we have been working on the Harvest for Hope grant program at the State Capitol. This program would help food banks across the state increase the supply of fresh and healthy food for our friends and neighbors visiting food pantries.

As you may remember, the legislature adjourned last session before the proposal could be scheduled for a vote.

This year, the sponsors of Harvest for Hope - Representative Krug and Senator Petrowski - have been undeterred and tireless in their efforts to ensure that our state's agricultural surplus is shared with Wisconsin families at-risk of hunger.

We are so excited to report that both the Assembly (AB 577) and Senate (SB 487) bills have passed out of their respective committees and are headed to a full vote in each chamber! In fact, the Assembly is scheduled to take up the bill on February 20th!

If these bills pass both chambers, then Harvest for Hope will go onto the Governor for his signature, which would establish a new hunger fighting program in our state.

This is incredibly exciting.

As these bills head toward a vote in their respective chambers, we need your help to reach out to your state legislators to let them know that you support these proposals and that you want them to vote yes on AB 577 and SB 487!

Take action now!

Proposed Changes to SNAP in FY 19 Budget Proposal

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2018 Tagged:

On February 12, the Administration released its FY 19 Budget Proposal. Among many proposed changes, the budget outline seeks to make a 30% cut to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, also known as FoodShare in Wisconsin), amounting to $213 billion over ten years.

The proposal aims to achieve these cuts through increased work requirements and additional state administrative flexibility, including converting half of benefits for all SNAP families getting over $80 a month into a commodity food box program that contains shelf stable, dry goods. This would affect 80% of all families participating in SNAP.

While a good job is the best hunger fighting tool, simply requiring people to work or train without addressing some of the challenges and barriers that people might face isn't effective. These requirements often create artificial contraction in the program; people become ineligible due to arbitrary, broad work requirements, rather than by earning enough money to not be eligible. As we have outlined in our Principles for SNAP Reform - Work Training Must Work.

The proposal to convert half of SNAP benefits into a prescribed box of commodity foods is extremely curious, given that the budget also defunds the Commodity Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (CSFP), which perhaps ironically, is a commodity food box of shelf stable dry goods for low-income seniors. The idea not only seems duplicative of the CSFP program, but also the Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP), which provides commodities to food banks and other agencies to distribute to local food pantries.

One of the key design features of SNAP is that it gives families the opportunity to choose and buy the types of food that is right for them and their families. The proposed food box is a prescribed box of dry goods that does not take into account a family's dietary needs or does it provide for fresh fruits and vegetables that we know that families want and need.

Recognizing the importance of choice and the dignity of families in need of temporary food assistance, the emergency food network in Wisconsin and across the nation has been promoting the "client choice" model as a best practice. In this model, food pantry visitors can choose the kinds of food they want and need.

We need your help! Add your name to our petition that asks our Members of Congress to fight for a budget and Farm Bill that protects SNAP so that Wisconsin families continue having the choice, dignity, and benefits to buy the food they need to work, learn and live healthy lives. We will be visiting DC later this month and we will be delivering these signatures to our members of Congress!

Take Action on the Tax Reform Proposals

Posted by David Lee in on Nov 1, 2017 Tagged:

The Senate starts debate this week on their version of a tax reform bill that was passed by the Senate Finance Committee on November 16th. This follows the passage of the House’s version of a tax reform package.

Like the House version, the Senate proposal would cut individual and corporate tax rates, repeal most deductions, and according to Congressional Budget Office analysis, would add $1.4 trillion to the federal deficit over the next decade.

As Congress works to negotiate and pass a final tax reform bill that reconciles key differences between the Senate and House versions, there are a number of policy issues at play that Hunger Fighters and non-profit supporters should be concerned about.

Please take action today!

*Update: The Senate Budget Committee passed their version of Tax Reform on 11/28/17, moving it one step closer to a full Senate vote. Your outreach to your Senators is more important than ever.

Tax reform should also benefit lower income Americans

Taxes provide the revenue for the federal government to provide for the common good, like building roads and infrastructure, funding the military, helping state and local governments fund schools, and providing for the general welfare of its citizens. These investments bind us as a nation and provide the resources for people to build thriving communities where they live.

The questions at the core of the public discussion on tax reform are important ones and we recognize that tough, challenging tradeoffs are necessary to strike the right balance of benefits to American taxpayers, an extremely broad and diverse stakeholder group.

We are confident that such a tax reform proposal is possible but the current tax reform proposals do not provide enough of a direct benefit to the taxpayers who are most at risk of being food insecure. In fact, according to the same CBO report, taxes for people making under $30,000 would actually increase by 2019.

Increase of Federal deficit

As mentioned, the tax reform proposals would increase the Federal deficit by at least $1.4 trillion over the next 10 years. The lost revenue will undoubtedly increased pressure to cut important federal programs that provide vital assistance to states and local governments that help people living in local communities in our state.

We fully expect that with the increase in the federal deficit, the pressure to cut important hunger fighting and health promoting programs like Medicare, Medicaid, SNAP, the National School Lunch Program, and WIC to increase over the next few years.

While the charitable sector does great work filling in the gaps in human service programs, it is not equipped to deal with the increase in need should significant cuts to the federal social safety net occur.

For example, the charitable food network in Wisconsin is less than 10% of all of the federal nutrition spending in our state. Some early proposals to cut the SNAP program by 25% would effectively wipe out the impact of every last pound of food the emergency food network in Wisconsin distributed in 2016, twice over.

Reduction of the donation incentive

Both the Senate and House version of the tax reform proposal keep the Charitable Giving Deduction, a century-old tax policy provision that gives taxpayers that itemize their tax return the ability to deduct their donations to charity.

However, both versions also double the standard deduction that taxpayers can take. While this would greatly simplify most Americans's tax returns, this would also greatly reduce the number of taxpayers that itemize their taxes and therefore takes away the charitable giving incentive from about 95% of taxpayers.

According to some estimates, this could reduce charitable giving by $13 billion a year.

We know that our donors are generous and they give because they are concerned about fighting hunger in their communities not because of the tax incentive but data across the non-profit network suggests that the tax incentive impacts how much people give.

Food banks in our network receive 25% of their annual donations in the month December, which suggest that the incentive does drive some end of the year tax planning.

Potential Repeal of the Johnson Amendment

The Johnson Amendment is a provision in the tax code that prohibits 501(c)(3) non-profit organizations from endorsing or opposing political candidates.

We are concerned about the potential repeal of the Johnson Amendment because the non-profit community - and the issues and people we serve and represent - should remain a place free from the partisanship.

In this era of hyper partisanship and polarization, we believe that the non-profit community ought to be preserved as a place where trusted information can be found on the important issues that affect local communities.

Feeding Wisconsin joined a letter signed by thousands of national and state non-profits asking our members of Congress to ensure that the Johnson Amendment is preserved in the tax reform.

For a comparison of how the two tax reform bills compare, please see this chart prepared by the National Council on Nonprofits.

Senate action on tax reform will start this week and given the goal to have a bill to the President’s desk by Christmas, things will happen quickly over the next few weeks. It is important that you reach out to your members of Congress to let them know how the tax reform proposals would affect low-income Americans and non-profits in Wisconsin and throughout our nation.

Please take action today to tell your Members of Congress that you want a better tax reform proposal, one that protects low-income Wisconsinites and the non-profit organizations that serve them.

Senate and House Pass Budget Bills

Posted by David Lee in on Oct 1, 2017 Tagged:

As of last week, both the House and the Senate have passed versions of their FY18 budget bills.

The House was the first to take action, passing its version of the budget which retained many of the proposed $160 billion in cuts to SNAP, through the full House in early October.

A few weeks later in mid-October, the full Senate passed its version of an FY 18 budget through the full Senate. While the Senate's proposed budget does not directly cut SNAP, it sets the groundwork for potential future cuts due to reduced revenue.

It appears that the House will be voting to take on the Senate's version of the budget this Thursday. This avoids a conference committee between the House and Senate to negotiate the differences in their budget bills and paves the way for legislators to use "reconciliation" as a procedural tool to pass a tax reform bill later this year.

While the Senate's version of the bill does not cut SNAP directly - and also makes a Farm Bill in 2018 an easier task - the addition of $1.5 trillion to the Federal deficit to fund tax cuts may make future spending cuts more likely on a host of programs, including important hunger fighting and health promoting programs like SNAP and Medicaid.

Both the House and the Senate votes were extremely close - 219 to 206 in the House and 51-49 in the Senate. This doubly reinforces the importance of your engagements with your Members of Congress.

Thank all of you who have been reaching out to your Members of Congress asking them to support a budget that fights hunger and improves health by protecting SNAP from deep cuts and harmful structural changes. Thank you so much for continuing to stand up and lending your voice in support of this important hunger-fighting program.

We will continue to follow this process closely and will keep you updated.

Thank you, Walmart!

Posted by David Lee in on Aug 1, 2017 Tagged:

A large part of our work fighting hunger, improving health and strengthening communities is our state FoodShare Outreach program. The program started in 2015 and was funded in large part by a 2-year grant from The Walmart Foundation, and we are thrilled to announce that The Walmart Foundation renewed their partnership with Feeding Wisconsin to continue providing this service to our friends and neighbors living in every corner of our state.

FoodShare helps almost 700,000 of our friends and neighbors living below or near the poverty line with a small amount of grocery benefits that they can utilize to purchase the food they need to work, learn and build a better life.

In FY 17, our statewide FoodShare outreach program had over 8,000 client contacts helped with over 5,000 people with program “assists.” Based on state averages, this is equal to over 3 million meals that we were able to help connect to families, children and individuals!

Through this partnership with the Walmart Foundation, Feeding Wisconsin will be able to continue providing statewide access to FoodShare benefits through its FoodShare Outreach program and FoodShare Helpline. The FoodShare Helpline assists people living in all counties of Wisconsin with accurate program information, connections to local resources, and high-quality application assistance.

In addition, one goal of this grant is to train and engage additional partners in providing onsite application assistance, furthering the capacity of our program to reach those who are interested in more information and assistance applying.

For example, one of our current outreach partners is a homeless shelter. The director went through the FoodShare outreach and application assistance training and she shared how important it was for her to be able to provide this assistance.

She mentioned how difficult it can be for a client experiencing homelessness to navigate numerous community services and how helpful it was now to be able to not only ask a client if they have FoodShare benefits and refer to the food bank staff, but be able to provide them with application assistance right there on the spot, removing one more step in the process for clients to connect to resources to improve their lives. The ability to assist these clients directly has been powerful and has filled a great need in the services that they are able to provide.

If you are a partner who is interested in getting engaged in FoodShare outreach work, please reach out to Stephanie Dorfman, our FoodShare Outreach Program Manager at sdorfman@feedingwi.org.

Together, with you and with partners like the Walmart Foundation, we are Feeding Wisconsin.

Stories from the Field: Fighting Hunger and Improving Health

Posted by David Lee in on Jul 1, 2017 Tagged:

Hunger and health are intimately connected. This became incredibly clear to us in the wake of the 2008 Great Recession when food banks in Wisconsin and across the nation began hearing a story that involved a family needing help from the food bank because a family member had an accident or illness and due to a the massive job dislocations at the time, also lost their employer provided healthcare.

The most common refrain, "I never thought I ever need help from the food pantry until I got sick and the medical bill started to pile up."

As members of Congress continue to debate the future of healthcare, potential changes to the structure and funding of important healthcare programs like Medicaid (BadgerCare in Wisconsin) and Medicare concern us, as any cuts would undoubtedly continue to put pressure on the household budgets of our friends and neighbors utilizing these programs for their healthcare.

At the same time, Congress continues to mull over massive cuts to SNAP (FoodShare in Wisconsin). SNAP and health programs like Medicaid and Medicare work in concert with each other to ensure that all eligible families have the food and healthcare they need to work toward a better tomorrow.

It is possible that if the cuts to Medicaid, Medicare and FoodShare are implemented at the scale proposed, we will likely hear a new version of the story I alluded to, with a new refrain: "I always thought that I could move on from the food pantry and be more healthy but then I lost FoodShare and Medicaid.”

It is with this in mind that we bring you a few stories from the field, collected by our food banks' FoodShare Outreach Specialists that highlight how FoodShare helps to maximize improve the health of people living in Wisconsin.

Betty and Dave

Before “Betty” and “Dave” retired, they were farmers. Now in retirement, they were trying to figure out how to live off of their joint Social Security income, which amounted to less than $1,200 a month between the two of them (less than $14,400 a year).

Betty explained that when you add up all of their monthly expenses, such as supplemental health insurance, auto insurance, home insurance, drug insurance, medications, hospital bills, property tax, utility costs, etc., they would often run short of money by the end of the month and when that happened they would have to choose between paying the bills, buying food or getting medications. As former farmers, knew how to be frugal but this was impossible. The first sacrifice was always food, the next would be medication, and the last resort would be paying less on all of their other bills.

When they received a letter about FoodShare benefits, they were intrigued. They had never heard of the program and so they decided to call the FoodShare Helpline to learn more. They were found to be eligible for FoodShare and Energy Assistance and they were referred to the Medicare Assistance Plan—which would put an extra $210 each month in their pocket. Betty and Dave also looked to enrolling in Senior Care, a prescription drug plan that costs $30/year, far less than what they had been paying.

Betty and Dave had never heard about these important programs. While it was a tough decision for them to ask for and get help because as they said, "we farmed all our life and just did what we had to do to get by," they were very glad to have done it because now they have just a bit of help to cover their food and medical care.

Rich

“Rich” is from a small town in Wisconsin and worked at the same place for 30 years. He recently had to begin dialysis because of kidney failure. Despite having health insurance, the cost of medication, the dialysis and the loss of income has taken a toll on him physically and financially. While he has lived an extremely frugal life and has few needs, health and food are two that he can't sacrifice.

Then, one day, while working on a computer at a local library, Rich saw information about FoodShare on a mouse pad. Not knowing anything about FoodShare, he the FoodShare Helpline to learn a little bit more. After a conversation with our friendly staff, Rich thought the program could help him.

A few days later, one of our Outreach Specialists met him and helped him through an application, as well as introducing him to a number of other programs that could help him, like energy assistance, the ADRC for rides to and from his dialysis appointments, and the Medicare premium assistance program.

Rich now gets $110 a month on his FoodShare card, assistance to his dialysis appointments three times a week, has received energy assistance, and is in the process of applying for MAP.

A few months ago, Rich was struggling to figure out how to get help with his increasing bills and transportation to his dialysis appointments. Now, after seeing a mouse pad in a library with information about FoodShare and the HelpLine, he won't worry about his next meal or getting the medical care he needs.

Keeping Our Nation's Promise

Posted by David Lee in on Jul 4, 2017 Tagged:

Earlier this week, the House budget committee released their plan for Fiscal Year 2018 spending and after a day of committee mark-up, passed the FY 18 budget resolution along party lines. The budget resolution included reconciliation instructions that would force $203 billion in cuts in mandatory programs, including instructions to the House Agriculture Committee to find at least $10 billion in cuts, likely to come from SNAP.

In addition, the resolution suggests other changes and cuts to SNAP that could result into another $150 billion in cuts over the next 10 years. Cuts to SNAP and other important programs included in this budget will make it harder for people to maintain the nutrition needed to find and keep good paying jobs and keep their families strong.

In Wisconsin, SNAP is a critical tool to working families, helping them bridge the gap between food needs and available resources. SNAP helps nearly 700,000 of our friends and neighbors living in every corner of our state, from the Bayfield to Kenosha and from the Mississippi River to Green Bay, put nutritious food on the table.

We all have a role to play in fighting hunger, improving health and strengthening communities. SNAP, along with food banks, local soup kitchens, after school programs, and churches, strengthens communities and puts families on the pathway to success.

Like the President's FY 18 budget proposal, Feeding Wisconsin is opposed to this budget resolution as it would again break our nation's promise to provide a nutrition safety net to our friends and neighbors trying their best to live healthy lives.

This is a critical time to weigh in with your Members of Congress to build momentum against the House budget proposal. Please consider reaching out to your Member of Congress to tell them that you do not support this any budget that would increase the risk of hunger for Wisconsinites and that you want them to oppose it when it comes to the House floor for a vote.

We are committed to working with our Members of Congress in the budget process and the upcoming farm bill to find sustainable solutions that fight hunger, improves health and strengthens communities.

We hope you will join us.

Take Action Against FoodShare Cuts

Posted by David Lee in on May 2, 2017 Tagged:

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, known as FoodShare in Wisconsin) is an important nutrition assistance program that helps to strengthen communities by providing families with low-incomes a bit of assistance to ensure that they have the food they need to work, learn, and get their lives back on track. It is a promise that Americans have made to ensure that none of our friends and neighbors have to be suffer from hunger day after day.

There are proposals at both the state and federal levels that would significantly alter the promise that we have made to families with low-incomes working to build a better life and we need you to take action on both items this week.

The President's 2018 Budget Proposal

The Administration released President Trump's 2018 budget proposal on Tuesday, May 23 which calls for a $193 billion cut to FoodShare over 10 years. This is more than a 25% cut from current investment levels and if implemented as proposed, it would fundamentally break the promise that Americans have made to provide very basic nutrition assistance to our friends and neighbors.

It also aims to cut $800 billion from Medicaid over the same timeframe. Taken together, this budget makes clear that the administration places little value in the help that the largest hunger and health programs provide to millions of American families.

These cuts would greatly increase the risk of hunger for millions of Americans and hundreds of thousands of our friends and neighbors living in Wisconsin.

While the President's budget is simply a proposal that sets the terms of debate by outlining the Administration's spending priorities, the formulation of the final budget is ultimately in the hands of our members of Congress.

It is very important that you get in touch with your Members of Congress to let them know that your do not support the President's budget and that you want them to work towards a budget that fights hunger, not one that would increase hunger.

Feeding Wisconsin is incredibly concerned about these proposed cuts. We believe that there are very real opportunities to strengthen and fine-tune the FoodShare program in order to improve its efficacy and outcomes at fighting hunger, improving health, and strengthening communities.

We are looking forward to working with our members of Congress through the appropriations and Farm Bill process to ensure that important federal nutrition programs like FoodShare retain their ability to help families with their food needs so that they can focus on building a better life for themselves.

Take action on President Trump's 2018 budget proposal today!

Meanwhile, back in Madison...

The Joint Finance Committee will be voting this week on a number of budget proposals that aim to change the way FoodShare is administered in Wisconsin, limiting access to this important program for nearly 100,000 Wisconsinites.

We've covered the proposed changes here and now is the time to reach out to the Joint Finance Committee to let them know that you oppose making the FoodShare program more difficult for eligible, hard working families participate in by implementing overly broad, arbitrary, non-targeted requirements and an asset policy that unfairly targets families that have worked hard and played by the rules.

Take action on the proposed State changes to FoodShare today!

Increased funding for federal food programs in FY 17

Posted by David Lee in on May 5, 2017 Tagged:

There was a flurry of legislative activity at the beginning of May in DC which bring both good news and continued uncertainty to our ability to fight hunger, improve health ad strengthen communities.

Increased funding for emergency food!

Congress managed to avert a government shutdown by passing HR 244 on May 1, which funds the government until the end the Federal fiscal year (September, 2017).

In the bill, funding for federal food commodities distributed through food banks and other agencies (known as TEFAP) received an additional $19 million in funding for the remainder of FY 2017. Funds to help offset the costs of storage and distribution also received an additional $5 million.

While our food banks do not distribute TEFAP commodities, we strongly support expanded funding for food and the full allocation for storage and infrastructure. This additional funding was a significant win for food banks, food pantries, and our friends and neighbors in Wisconsin and throughout the nation.

Other key nutrition and safety net programs also fared well in the legislation, including modest increases for Senior Congregate Meals and Senior Home Delivered Meals.

Thank you for reaching out to your elected officials on these issues! In this environment, they need to hear from you about why these programs are so important!

Healthcare?

Now, onto the uncertain news: The House also passed the American Healthcare Act (AHCA). In its current form, the bill would essentially block grant the Medicaid program, eliminate subsidies that reduce deductibles and other costs for Marketplace enrollees with low-incomes, and would allow insurers to charge older Americans significantly more for insurance than younger people, among many other things. The bill now moves onto the Senate for consideration and changes.

Some estimates suggest that over 200,000 Wisconsinites could stand to lose coverage and see premiums increase by 20%.

As we have learned in a survey of our food pantry clients, out of pocket medical costs are one of the key drivers that lead people to utilize our services.

On the horizon...

Now that the House has passed the AHCA, it can move onto tax reform. The recent outline of the administration’s tax proposal does keep the charitable tax deduction intact.

However, by doubling the standard deduction, there may be fewer people who itemize their tax return, which could affect the nearly 28 million taxpayers who currently itemize and who are responsible for over 1/3 of total charitable giving in America.

In the tax reform discussions, Feeding Wisconsin joins many of our non-profit partners in supporting the creation of a Universal Deduction, or a non-itemizer deduction, for charitable gifts. This would extend the ability to deduct charitable gifts to all taxpayers, regardless of their itemization status, thus unlocking the full potential and generosity of all American taxpayers.

Stay up to date!

If you haven't already, please sign to be a Feeding Wisconsin Hunger Fighter to receive these updates and and action alerts straight into your inbox.

Supercharging our generosity through the tax code

Posted by David Lee in on Apr 1, 2017 Tagged:

After getting back from Eau Claire, I spent the rest of last week getting our food banks prepared for the possible changes to the charitable tax deduction through tax reform.

Taxes, I know, real scintillating stuff.

But it’s really important, because the tax code is an important policy instrument. For example, the Earned Income Tax Credit, which is an important income support for millions of working families, is delivered through the tax code.

The tax deduction for charitable giving is the lifeblood of hundreds of thousands of important charitable organizations throughout the nation and in Wisconsin. It helps to magnify the generosity of our citizens and encourages them to get involved in and become stakeholders in important local issues, like hunger and food insecurity.

The deduction works like this: if you itemize their deductions, for every dollar that you donate to qualified 501(c)3 organizations like ours and our member food banks, you lower your taxable income equal to your marginal tax bracket.

So, in English: if you’re in the 25% tax bracket, for every $100 you donate, you can lower your taxable income by $25. If you’re in the highest tax bracket (39%), for every $10,000 you donate, you can lower your taxes by $3,960.

Recent tax reform proposals would change the century-old charitable tax deduction and reduce the incentive for giving by raising the standard deduction and cap the deduction for a single person at $100,000 and $200,000 for a married couple.

By raising the standard deduction, fewer people will itemize their deductions, which would reduce the amount of people making donations.

The proposed cap on deductions will affect major donors, as a married couple donating $1 million dollars will only be able to realize one-fifth of the benefit.

Our participating food banks and the over 1,000 affiliated food pantries and meal programs located in and serving our friends and neighbors in all 72 counties of our state depend on the generosity of local communities to invest their time, treasure and talent to fighting hunger.

We know the inspiring generosity of Wisconsinites throughout our state. We are beneficiaries of it every day. At the same time, the data show that the incentive for charitable giving matters.

December is the busiest month to receive donations. Our food banks raise nearly a quarter of their annual revenue in December, with a majority of it coming in within the last week of the month as our friends and neighbors are feeling both more generous and thinking about their taxes.

With the continued pressure for non-profits to deliver essential services, the charitable tax deduction must be strengthened and expanded, not narrowed.

With marginal tax rates, deductions, and the like on my mind at the end of last week, I finally sat down to do our taxes over the weekend. And while we had a tax bill (our online tax software tells me that doggie treats are not deductible for us), we still turned tax time into dinner time for many of our friends and neighbors living in our state by making a donation to our food banks through the Wisconsin tax check off. If you haven't filed yet, it’s so easy to do - learn more here.

Inspiration in Eau Claire

Posted by David Lee in on Mar 4, 2017 Tagged:

Earlier this week, I got to spend the day in Eau Claire with over 100 volunteers from food pantries throughout West Central Wisconsin at the Feed My People Food Bank Partner Agency Conference which took place at Trinity Lutheran Church.

Feed My People Food Bank really knows how to get value out of their engagements - they had me do a general talk about hunger and poverty in Wisconsin and how local partners are making a difference, then a media interview, then a session on improving your food, friends and funds through storytelling, and finally a session on state and federal food policies.

It was a long day but also energizing. Being able to meet and learn from so many committed, passionate Hunger Fighters in local communities throughout the state is just incredibly inspiring. These engagements with local pantries and volunteers throughout the state are the favorite part of my job.

At the breakfast and lunch sessions, I sat at a table with a church group from Fountain City in Buffalo County. They were inspired to start a a food pantry in their community by a young lady had recently started a weekend backpack program for children. Backpack programs provide food for children during the weekend when they are out of school.

They told me that originally this program was only supposed to be a one-off but the demand in the community was so high, it has grown into a regular community supported program.

As I later learned, this inspiring young lady was someone I had met earlier in the day who I was paired with in my storytelling session to share a story. Rather than telling me about the program she started, she told me a story about how she bagged her first buck on a hunting trip with her dad. It was a twelve-pointer - pretty impressive by any measure - but maybe not as impressive as starting a program that fights child hunger at a hunger fighting conference.

Whether she was just being humble or she unwittingly buried the lede, I thought that this was remarkably telling about the kind of people who volunteer to fight hunger in local communities throughout the state.

It’s just what they do. It's nothing that special. They see a problem and they do something about it.

But along the way, their choice for action inspires others to get involved, like the church group that was inspired by this young lady to start fighting hunger themselves.

This is why I love this part of my job - learning about those moments of inspiration and what gets people going to join us in our mission to help our food banks fight hunger, improve health, and strengthen local communities. It gives me hope.

Turn tax time into dinner time for Wisconsin families

Posted by David Lee in on Mar 4, 2017 Tagged:

That old saw to "Beware the Ides of March" may have been simply a warning that the tax man is looming.

But in Wisconsin, you shouldn't beware the ides of March because this year, as in years past, you can turn tax time into dinner time for Wisconsin families through the Wisconsin Tax Check Off program.

The program helps you easily donate a portion of your state tax refund to our network of regional food banks in Wisconsin. Our food banks are wholly owned, operated and supported by everyday families living throughout our great state and we depend on your generosity in order to ensure that our friends and neighbors have access to the healthy and nutritious food they need to work, learn and live healthy lives.

It's really easy. If you use tax preparation software like TurboTax, an option to donate to local charities will come up toward the end of your state return.

Simply select "Hunger Relief" or "Feeding America" and voila, you're done. TurboTax will even remember your donation for your charitable deduction next year!

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option, option "F," to donate on line 20 of the short form or line 53 on the long form.

Funds will be distributed between the Feeding Wisconsin food banks by the percentage of the state that each one serves. Our food banks provide food resources, technical assistance, and grants to over 1,000 affiliated food pantries and meal programs in all 72 counties of our state. We have statewide impact and deep local reach.

For every dollar that you donate, our food banks can provide at least 3 meals to the families that visit local food programs.

2017 Lobby Visits

Posted by David Lee in on Mar 2, 2017 Tagged:

Last week, we were in Washington DC for the annual National Anti-Hunger Policy Conference, where over 1,300 advocates from across the nation converged on our nation's capital for two days of best practice sharing, networking, and learning.

The conference culminated in our annual Hill Day where we took to Capitol Hill to visit our entire Congressional delegation to talk about our hunger fighting priorities for the year. With the uncertainties swirling in DC, it was more important than ever before for us to be there to tell the stories of the friends and neighbors we serve.

We met with every member of our House delegation and both of our US Senate offices and in each meeting, we discussed the vital and important promise that Wisconsinites and Americans have made to provide basic nutrition assistance to our friends and neighbors working through a tough time in life. We shared with them our principles for ensuring a strong SNAP (FoodShare) program for Wisconsin taxpayers and raised our opposition to any proposal that would block grant this important program.

Our friends at the Wisconsin CAP association (WISCAP) spoke about the importance of The Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP), the federal commodity program that they administer to local CAP agencies. Together, our networks facilitate the distribution of over $100 million dollars worth of food every year. That is a lot of food going through our affiliated food pantries and meal programs.

However, it's important to note that the SNAP program provides about $1 billion worth of vital food buying benefits to our friends and neighbors throughout the state.

That's 10 times the entire emergency food system! A 10% cut to the SNAP program in Wisconsin would wipe out all of the work of the charitable food system.

The federal nutrition programs work in partnership with the charitable food system to ensure all people have access to a bit of help when they are down on their luck. The charitable system cannot replace or replicate the scale and efficiency of the federal nutrition programs and federal nutrition programs can't replace the person to person contact that the charitable system provides. They are each necessary components of a working safety net and are complimentary, not duplicative.

While we were in DC to meet with our elected officials face to face, you don't have to fly all the way there to have the same impact. According to a 10-year Congressional Management Foundation study, direct constituent contact is the most effective in shaping the views of legislators. Making phones ring is great but emails are good too.

You can use our Elected Official locator to find the contact information of your federal, state or local elected official or you can personalize an email to them about your opposition to any block grants to vital nutrition assistance programs.

Governor Walker's New Work Requirement for FoodShare

Posted by David Lee in on Jan 1, 2017 Tagged:

On Monday, as part of the rollout of his state budget, Governor Walker introduced a wide-ranging array of proposed reforms to important assistance programs that help hundreds of thousands of our friends and neighbors living in Wisconsin to have the resources and skills they need to move toward opportunity.

While some of the proposals are encouraging, such as phasing out childcare assistance - as opposed to elimination - for families earning just above 200% of the Federal Poverty Line, one proposal to require families with children to work 20 hours a week as a condition to receive FoodShare benefits, is a bit more concerning.

We believe that for those who can work, a good paying job is the best tool in the fight against hunger and FoodShare is an important work support that ensures Wisconsin families have the food and energy they need to be ready for work.

Therefore, we broadly share the Governor's goal to fight hunger through improving employment. However, given the geographic distribution of the available jobs in Wisconsin and where job training programs are located, many of the people participating in the FoodShare program can experience significant barriers to take advantage of these opportunities, such as lack of transportation or access to high-quality, dependable, affordable childcare.

Access to childcare is particularly salient since of the FoodShare households with minors, 66% consist of single parent households. With not other parental unit, jobs that may require long travel times or jobs are outside of first shift can be out of reach for many single parents whose main focus may be childcare.

In 2015, Wisconsin implemented a requirement for single adults without children to work 20 hours a week as a condition to receive FoodShare. The consequences for non-compliance are particularly harsh: sanctioned individuals are limited to FoodShare benefits for three months, every three years.

While the proposed sanctions for non-compliance by adults with children would only reduce the FoodShare benefit for the adult in the family, it is important to note that since food is purchased for the whole family rather than for individual family members, this is the same as reducing the overall FoodShare benefit for the entire family.

Rather than implementing an overly broad, one-size fits all work requirement that does not take into consideration and laser target the needs of hard working families trying to play by the rules, we would support fine-tuning existing programs and current law to better assess, understand and address the barriers that FoodShare participants face in getting available jobs or enrolling in job training programs.

By better understanding the challenges and barriers to employment, we can better tailor these programs to meet the needs of families trying to work through a tough patch in their lives. This would help us be better stewards of taxpayer dollars and ensure that all families have the opportunities and the food they need to work, learn, and participate in building thriving communities.

Food for the Holidays

Posted by David Lee in on Nov 5, 2016 Tagged:

Last night, I helped to answer phones for Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin's Food for the Holidays phone bank at Fox 6. It was great to meet the volunteers, many of whom were from Associated Bank, and learn about them and their commitment to fight hunger.

Fox 6 helped to promote the fund drive throughout their evening and nightly newscast. Every time, they threw over to us, the phones would light up.

Most of the donations I processed were for small amounts. $10 and $15 donations. One was for $5. Every little bit counts. Because of our purchasing scale, our food banks are able to acquire food at much lower cost than the general public or even other food organizations. This helps to make everybody's dollar stretch and why our food banks are able to claim that every $1 donated to them results in 3 meals.

These small donations also pointed to something deeper for me: While many of the donors I spoke to may not have been extremely well off, they chose to give what they could in order to pay it forward and ensure that others in their community could have a good holiday.

That's the essence of community and the spirit of the holidays.

One caller from the night put this is unbelievably stark relief:

A call comes in and I go through my spiel about donating for the holidays and I ask how much the caller would like to donate. The man on the other line says that he is unfortunately not in a financial position to be able to make a donation and that he is calling for his dad, who is very old and in poor health.

The man asks about how we might be able to help him get a turkey for Thanksgiving. Not thinking much of it, I take his name and phone number down and tell him someone from the food bank would get back to him in the next few days.

What the man said next punched me in the gut.

He said, “Thank you so much. This is really important for me this year. My dad is 93 and this is will probably be his last Thanksgiving and I really want to be able to have a turkey for him.”

Food, especially during this time of year, carries with it a lifetime of meaning. It's through these holiday meals shared with friends and family that we mark the progress in our lives. These meals remind us that we are cared for and loved and remembered.

Are food restrictions the only way to improve health?

Posted by David Lee in on Oct 3, 2016 Tagged:

Last week at the Wisconsin Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics meeting, one of our partners - a retired doctor and a fierce advocate for food insecurity screening in primary care settings - and I got into a conversation about improving the health of people with low-incomes by restricting FoodShare benefits. In the lunch line, naturally.

She and I have had this back and forth before - she’s more open to restrictions in the FoodShare program whereas I’m more opposed to them - but this time, she was armed with this New York times article reporting on a recent study that showed that restrictions, when paired with incentives, helped to improve the eating habits of people with low-incomes.

Since previous studies have already shown that incentives by themselves are effective at improving diet quality for people with limited incomes, I am given to wonder why food restrictions as a policy instrument continue resurface. Last year, there was a state proposal to restrict what FoodShare recipients could buy with their benefits.

Here’s the thing about food choice restrictions: most people regardless of income eat poorly so any policy intervention to improve diet quality should be broad based and inclusive rather than targeting the people who have the least resources to procure healthful food. The fact that the diet quality of people receiving FoodShare is only marginally worse than those with higher incomes bears this out and so it seems unfair to force low-income families into only buying more expensive food.

Imposing restrictions on FoodShare just feels like punching down at people who are poor. That is to say, it would be easier to simply restrict what people can buy with FoodShare than it would be to punch upwards to make unhealthful food the less desirable, hard choice and ensure that healthful food is accessible, affordable, desirable, and the easy choice for everybody regardless of income.

On any given day, families with low-incomes deal with any number of small indignities that build up over time. Being told what they can and cannot buy or what kinds of food are right for them and their families should not be one of them. I can't help but believe that there are better, more effective and empowering ways to fight hunger and improve health.

Time, Treasure, Talent and Trust

Posted by David Lee in on Oct 1, 2016 Tagged:

Many of you may remember that last year around this time, we posted this video from "Adam Ruins Everything" about food drives:

I wrote that while I had once agreed with the basic premise that giving money to food banks and pantries is way more efficient than giving food, I had changed my tune about this issue because donating to food drives is a productive inefficiency as it is a gateway to our issue and serves as sort of a basic training hunger fighters.

I'm given to think about this again because we are entering into the last quarter of the year - October to December - which is often referred to as, “the busy time” in food bank world, a time when we are often humbled by the generosity of our friends and neighbors in every corner of the state.

The Season of Giving is upon us!

And it's an important time because our food banks are locally owned and supported by the communities in which they operate and they depend on the generous commitment of local donors for the majority of their operating funds throughout the year.

Donors come in all shapes and sizes. They can be local corporations and food manufacturers making large-scale food and fund donations; they could be farmers sharing their harvest with us to safely store and distribute to local food pantries; and of course, they are people like you writing checks and yes, dropping bags of groceries at the supermarket.

And donations come in all forms as well. While food and funds are always welcome, volunteering your time, giving your voice as an advocate, or educating others in the fight against food insecurity are equally important. Our staff has been writing about these important ways to get involved in their blog series during Hunger Action Month.

We value all of the ways you choose to donate and engage because we believe that by giving your time, treasure, and talent you have invested your most valuable asset - your trust - in us to continue leading the way forward toward our vision of a healthy and hunger-free Wisconsin.

So as you begin planning for your year end giving, I hope you consider giving to our food bank that serves the community in which you live. And after you write your check - or drop off your groceries - ask the staff how you might be able to increase your engagement to help us achieve a healthy and hunger-free Wisconsin!

Donate to one of our participating food banks:

Donate to us by ordering the "Do Gooder Burger" at Milwaukee Burger Company in Kenosha, Franklin, Appleton, Eau Claire, and Wausau. For every Do Gooder Burger sold, MBC will donate $1 to Feeding Wisconsin.

"When children don’t get enough to eat, their initial response to the world is mistrust.”

Posted by David Lee in on Sep 3, 2016 Tagged:

I'll be presenting at the Wisconsin Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics Fall Forum tomorrow. Their day is focused on the role of primary care in food security and in preparing for my talk, I went back and re-read the "Hungry Children" report authored by Dr. Raymond Wheeler for the Southern Regional Council.

As some of you may know, Dr. Wheeler and a delegation of doctors and researchers toured the rural south in the late 60's to get a clearer picture of what poverty and hunger looked like in those areas.

This is the first paragraph of the introduction:

Increasingly across the rural South in recent years have come reports of poverty so extreme as to be -- in an era of comparative national prosperity -- beyond the comprehension of middle class America. A great deal of statistical data already has been compiled on conditions. During the past twenty years, for example, over 200,000 farm laborers in Mississippi have been displaced by mechanization of farming operations.

This introduction could be lifted from this report written 40+ years ago and inserted into a similar report today and it would still be true.

That's not to say nothing has changed, in fact quite the opposite. The "Hungry Children" report plus the landmark CBS documentary "Hunger in America" pricked our national conscience and together, working in communities and with policymakers, we worked to vastly improve the tools we had to fight extreme hunger and deprivation: we created the WIC program, made the food stamps program free, and expanded free meals at school.

Going into the project, the doctors and researchers who worked on that report weren't hunger fighters. They were just a group of doctors trying to document the effects of deep poverty on children and better understand how they might improve their health.

Their simple conclusion? More food.

I also found the CBS documentary Hunger in America, which you should check out below. In it, Dr. Wheeler says, "When children don’t get enough to eat, their initial response to the world is mistrust.”

Collaborating for Impact

Posted by David Lee in on Aug 1, 2016 Tagged:

Earlier this week, we made a return trip up north to Ashland and Bayfield to continue engaging the local community about how an AmeriCorps supported program might add value to current and existing efforts to fight hunger.

We had originally planned this trip for mid-July but the rains and floods that swept through the region postponed the trip. Two weeks out, the Bad River still seemed precipitously high and in a wooded area just south of Lake Superior, many trees lay toppled, almost all of them had been violently uprooted from the earth.

It felt strange meeting with stakeholders to talk about fighting hunger while an active recovery was currently taking place. Just a dew days prior to our arrival, helicopters were dropping off emergency food at the Bad River Reservation and other AmeriCorps programs were organizing to help with the cleanup.

Or maybe it was the best time since the issue was front of mind. From a statistical perspective, Ashland county has the 5th highest food insecurity rate in our state, at nearly 14%. Iron and Vilas are the 6th and 7th highest at 13.5% and 13.2%. Often, food insecurity is framed as an urban problem but of the top 10 counties with highest rates of food insecurity, only one is a major metropolitan area - Milwaukee at number 2. The rest are places like Ashland, Iron and Vilas.

Given the challenges - vast, sparsely populated region with little to no public transportation and few, full-service grocery stores - fighting hunger in these areas requires a different set of tools than fighting hunger in Milwaukee.

The BRICK Ministries, a partner agency of our food bank Second Harvest Northern Lakes Food Bank, that serves a network of pantries throughout Ashland county, helped to convene the many stakeholders already fighting hunger in the community.

It was a great privilege to learn from so many passionate local hunger fighters and food system advocates gathered in one place. Despite already knowing each other, it occurred to them that they had never all been in the same room together to discuss these issues in this format and as a result, even the local stakeholders were learning from each other.

While there seemed to be some recognition that meetings like this could yield more impact, there was also hesitancy to add another meeting to the calendar. A similar insight came out of our Iron County meeting in June.

Why is coordinated collaboration and collective impact so difficult? It’s not a product of lacking knowledge or resources. There are plenty of meetings, plenty of projects, plenty of knowledge and plenty of passion. So what’s stopping us from marshaling our resources and breaking through the silos in which we operate so that we may coordinate our projects to drive toward real impact?

We have to believe that it’ll work and that by collaborating in a deeper way, sharing resources and building capacity together, we will be able to build power and really start to address the big, hairy, systemic problems in our communities.

It’s often just easier to stay in our own silos, do the good work we’re doing and just call it a day. Coordinating and collaborating deeply is a hard and messy work that is fraught with interpersonal dynamics, getting “credit,” and historical baggage.

If done right, however, we might actually go from transactional relationships to transformative impact. I think that's what we all want. We just have to commit to doing it.

Replacement FoodShare benefits available

Posted by David Lee in on Jul 2, 2016 Tagged:

Last week, major flooding occurred in northern Wisconsin, damaging roads, highways and cutting off power to many residents in the area. In some communities, up to 10 inches of rain was recorded in a short amount of time.

Earlier this week, Governor Walker declared a state of emergency, which triggered the availability of Disaster FoodShare benefits to help families recover any lost food due to the flooding. Families who wish to claim replacement benefits can fill out this form and turn it into their local IM office.

For any questions about replacement FoodShare or any other FoodShare related inquiries, please call our FoodShare Helpline at 1-877-366-3635.

What's at Stake in the Fight for Lunch Money?

Posted by David Lee in on Jun 4, 2016 Tagged:

I have a picture in my office of the signing ceremony of the Healthy, Hunger-Free Children Act of 2010. Everybody in the photo is happy and excited that a historic Child Nutrition reauthorization bill, one that included the biggest investment of new money to increase the nutrition standards of school meal programs, was being signed into law.

But, it came at a price.

Due to Congressional "pay-go" rules, the $4.5 billion in new investments over 10 years had to be offset by cuts to another program. In this case, the offset was found by cutting SNAP/FoodShare funding.

This was painful. I remember having many conversations with advocates about whether it was a good deal. In the end, many of us recognized that a historic improvement to child nutrition programs that could pass and be signed into law wasn't worth the risk of getting nothing or even a worse bill later.

Besides, the SNAP/FoodShare pay-for had already been identified as a potential funding source for something and so if not for Child Nutrition programs, it would likely have been targeted for something else, as it had been for other initiatives like state assistance to pay for teacher salaries and Medicaid.

Fast forward six years later: Child Nutrition is up again for reauthorization with two bills in play, and I often look at that picture hanging in my office as a reminder of what’s at stake.

The Senate version, which has broad bipartisan support, does a good job at making necessary and meaningful improvements to how child nutrition programs work in the summer time. This is important because while many of our children take a summer vacation, the risk of hunger doesn’t. And for the vast majority of children who depend on free and reduced price lunch during the school year, those meals aren’t as easy to access during the summer. Thus, the “summer meal gap.”

There’s also a version of the bill in the House. And while it does make some minor improvements to address the summer meal gap, it also rolls back many of the improvements we made in 2010 and seeks to pilot a block grant of the entire school meals program. This is something that we, and many other nutrition organizations, are opposed to.

What’s a block grant, you ask? Very simply, it’s a large sum of money that the federal government gives to state and local governments to run a program.

Proponents argue that block grants increase the flexibility of localities to experiment with program administration. This is true and something we should promote, just in other ways (more on that below). It is also true that a block grant to the school meals program would effectively cap the program, breaking the promise that our schools will serve every eligible child.

We can and must serve every eligible child and also give states and local school districts the flexibility they need to experiment and innovate to best tailor child nutrition programs to meet the needs of the children in their local communities. To incentivize that, Congress should authorize more demonstration projects that allow local communities to innovate on the existing programs. These investments should be made in addition to funding and strengthening the existing programs that already work, not at the expense of them.

Our kids are worth it. We proved it six years ago when we all came together and sacrificed to ensure that we could improve child nutrition programs. Millions of families across the nation, including hundreds of thousands here in Wisconsin, experienced a dip in their FoodShare benefits to ensure that our children have the nutrition they need to learn, play and grow.

You can help make sure that this shared sacrifice does not go for naught by taking these steps:

Learn more about Child Nutrition Reauthorization and the summer meal gap
Sign our petition for a strong Child Nutrition bill
Reach out to your member of Congress to tell them that you support making meaningful improvements to address the summer meal gap.
Share these with your friends and family to amplify your voice.

Thanks MPH!

Posted by David Lee in on Jun 5, 2016 Tagged:

Today we had to say goodbye to Maureen, our longest tenured employee. She will be fighting hunger with the Food Bank for the Heartland, a great food bank in Omaha, NE.

During MPH's time with us, she helped to connect over 2,300 of our friends and neighbors with over 1.6 million meals! Talk about having an impact!

Thank you MPH for all of your hard work! Best of luck in your future adventures!

The Self-Reliance of Asking for Help

Posted by David Lee in on Jun 3, 2016 Tagged:

As part of our AmeriCorps Planning Grant, we are in the Northwoods of Wisconsin learning from the community about how we might be able to help them fight hunger. We've been lucky to be able to partner with UW Madison's School of Human Ecology and the research team, led by Dr. Lori Bakken, has been very intentional in engaging local communities in a participatory manner to ensure that a potential program would be tailored to their needs.

To better understand the challenges rural communities face and how an AmeriCorps program could be deployed to address them, we met with Vilas County Extension and the Vilas County Food Pantry yesterday and earlier today, we took part in a county stakeholder meeting convened by Iron County Extension in Hurley Wisconsin.

Many common themes emerged: the prevalence of seasonal employment, the vast distances between services, and the lack of dependable transportation. An AmeriCorps member could easily help with existing efforts to address these challenges. However, there was one challenge that local stakeholders highlighted that has no easy solution: Sisu.

While untranslatable from Finnish, Sisu approximately means being imbued with internal strength (From Wikipedia: "...loosely translated to mean stoic determination, grit, bravery, guts, resilience, perseverance and hardiness...").

Sisu is a cultural touchstone and something that many of our friends and neighbors in the Northwoods have. In practice, it might mean that someone with Sisu might not go to the doctor, preferring rather to gut it out on their own.

There's something like Sisu in American culture too - rugged individualism.

These are great characteristics to have. Grit and self-reliance help people adapt to difficult circumstances, be independent and deepen a sense of self-efficacy and pride. These are all good things and are the base of our shared cultural wisdom that struggle builds character.

But I can't help but wonder about the moment when Sisu and rugged individualism become maladaptive. For example, there is a difference between someone who has Sisu who is hunting and growing their own food and the person who simply refuses to ask for help because of Sisu. While toughing it out, the first person is actually taking care of themselves and their family whereas the second person is hurting themselves and their family due to a deep, almost prideful cultural aversion to assistance.

This difference is hard to address. We try to do it through our FoodShare outreach program that provides education that is aimed at giving people the information they need to make the right choice for themselves and the assistance if they decide they need it.

It's often framed that self-reliance and getting help are mutually exclusive. I don't think this is right. In fact, asking for help might be the most authentically self-reliant thing a person can do. No outside person knows another person's limits and when he or she may really need help. Only that person knows. And they have to rely on themselves to accurately judge the situation and be brave enough to reach out for help. Gutsy "self-reliance" that leads to diminished life outcomes is not actually being successfully self-reliant.

Any time our Helpline receives a call from one of our neighbors in the state, that person has made an honest assessment of the challenges they are facing and are reaching out for help. That's not a sign of weakness. In some ways, that's a form of Sisu as well - the deep fortitude, determination, and persistence to make it through the tough times.

The Uncertain Hour

Posted by David Lee in on Apr 4, 2016 Tagged:

Marketplace's Wealth and Poverty team has launched an interesting new podcast called, "The Uncertain Hour" and it focuses on the things that we fight the most about but understand the least about. The first season centers on the continuing hot button topic: welfare.

The first episode - "The Magic Bureaucrat" - is about Larry Townsend, the former director of the Riverside Welfare office, who was one of the leaders of the welfare reform movement. It's a fascinating story that includes producing a 10-song welfare to work album, some unexpected short-term outcomes, and predictable long-term outcomes.

This series should be particularly interesting to many of us since Wisconsin was one of the states that began experimenting with welfare reform before Congress took it up in the late 90's. Jason DeParle's landmark book American Dream: Three Women, Ten Kids, and a Nation's Drive to End Welfare is a also great look at that time here in Wisconsin.

In 2016, 20 years after the welfare reform bill was signed, it's time we take a hard look back to better understand what "reform" meant in implementation and its consequences. The welfare reform bill did many things but the two big ones were to require work as a condition of getting benefits (a feature that as also extended to single adults without children enrolled in SNAP/FoodShare, or food stamps at the time) and to block grant the cash welfare program.

A block grant basically sets the amount of funds a state can have to administer a program with some broad rules about how the funds should be used. While this sounds innocuous, it can have devastating consequences on the accountability of a program and the flexibility the program has to adjust to changing local conditions.

There are lessons to be learned especially since we are seeing SNAP/FoodShare program being pushed down the same frightening path; work requirements are being reimplemented across the nation and the current House budget proposal would block grant the program, which would break the core promise that if you ran into tough times, society would provide just a little help so that you could buy the food you would need to get back on your feet.

This is the wrong starting point for how we improve the FoodShare/SNAP program. Grafting interventions popular in the 90's onto a program that was developed in the 60's will not position FoodShare to address food insecurity in the 21st century. We ought to have an honest discussion on how to continue improving the efficiency and effectiveness of the program with the tools that are available to us through data mining and matching and how SNAP can be leveraged combination with other programs as a platform for lifting families out of poverty.

Looking back on the effects of welfare reform, let's hope that this new podcast will have some useful lessons on how we have that conversation.

Framing Stories to Empower

Posted by David Lee in on Mar 5, 2016 Tagged:

Over the last few years, it seems like every non-profit has jumped on the storytelling bandwagon. It's hard to go to a conference without a session on storytelling and improving your storytelling skills.

Don't get me wrong. Stories are extremely important (in fact, I serve on the board of Ex Fabula, a local Milwaukee organization that builds community through the art of storytelling). A well-told story disengages our brain, which is hardwired to criticize, and engages our heart, which allows us to empathize. And it is for that very reason, how we tell stories, especially about the people who utilize our services, is perhaps even more important.

This is why I was so heartened this morning by this Marketplace Money story about the economic anxieties being experienced by Betty Moncrief, a senior living on a fixed income in Alabama. The story presents the tough daily choices she has to make with her limited resources and the stark reality of many she knows living with similar circumstances.

We go over her monthly finances. She gets a Social Security check every month for $754. She gets $79 a month in food stamps. That doesn’t go too far. Most fresh vegetables are out of reach.

“I haven’t bought brussel sprouts," Betty said. "I like eggplants. I don’t buy that. I don’t buy tomatoes all the time.”

[snip]

And Betty said she’s got friends who are a lot worse off than she is. Friends who don’t have family around, and who are running out of money. Betty said a handful of friends have even tried suicide.

But instead of making her seem pitiful and powerless, which is often the case for stories like these, this story frames her as an active agent in her own life, with hardworking values that we all share.

In the stack, a bill for $34.44. It's her monthly payment toward a vault for her grave.

“It’s my only luxury that I’m really paying for, for myself," she said. "Somebody got to buy it. So I might as well try to buy it myself.”

[snip]

Betty said when she’s feeling low or doesn’t feel well, she gets active. She grabs a rake, grabs her neighbor and heads outside.

“We be out there raking up dirt in the back alley," she said, laughing. "Picking it up – and leaves. Trying to keep it clean.”

She said she’s making it, and that she won’t give up.

A less sensitive storyteller may have chosen to frame Betty's struggle in a way that didn't empower her and unfortunately, many of the stories we hear in the media about people who need help are framed in such a way. I understand why; it's a hard thing to do when you are on deadline. But, the vast majority of people that I have met dealing with tough challenges in life are confronting those challenges with a similar form of Betty's resilience and optimism. And their full stories should be told.

The Rise of College Food Pantries

Posted by David Lee in on Mar 5, 2016 Tagged:

When I was traveling the country doing focus groups on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, known as FoodShare in Wisconsin), it became very clear that people with only partial college have it really tough. They are often saddled with debt and having stopped their college course load, they don't have the degree to get the job that would help to get them out of debt. Partial college with debt is like an albatross dragging people from reaching their full potential.

And as we are learning, the line between simply being the proverbial poor college student and being a someone with partial college is razor thin.

Back in December, researchers at the Wisconsin HOPE lab at the University of Wisconsin Madison released the results of a study that suggested over half of community college students are food insecure. Many of these kids are just trying to improve themselves and get the skills necessary to move up the socioeconomic ladder:

In addition to the survey, Goldrick-Rab in an interview said that in related studies she conducted focus groups with students at other colleges and tracked 50 low-income students over six years. She found that two types of students struggle with food insecurity. The first group of students were in poverty before they began college; in their case, hunger and poverty is a preexisting condition. The second includes those who were in the lower-middle class before they started college and were forced by their higher-education expenses to deal with food insecurity for the first time.

Many college campuses have begun to address this issue by forming campus food pantries. And yet, as this Morning Edition story exposes, many of these campus efforts face the same challenges to distribute food as neighborhood food pantries, namely the shame and stigma that people experience in asking for help.

At the same time, rules for college students to receive FoodShare can be confusing and convoluted. In general, students enrolled in a 4-year University are not eligible but students enrolled in 2-year tech schools, may be eligible. All students are eligible if they are:

Employed @ least 20 hrs per week
Self-employed @ least 20 hrs/week
Participating in work study
Responsible for a child under 6 yrs (2 parent household)
Responsible for a child over 6, but under 12, and if child care is unavailable (if there are 2 parents)
Responsible for a child under 12 (single parent household)
Physically or mentally unfit for employment
Enrolled in W-2 or receiving TANF

College students who may have low-incomes or come from families that may not be able to financially support them should be focused on their studies and papers so that they can get on the path to opportunity. They should not be worried about where their next meal is coming from.

Thank you for your support of Harvest for Hope

Posted by David Lee in on Mar 2, 2016 Tagged:

The 2016 state legislative session has wrapped up and unfortunately, we were not able to pass SB 474 Harvest for Hope.

Thanks to many of you, we had really good momentum but in the end, we just didn’t have enough time to get the bill scheduled for a full vote.

Sometimes, even the most common-sense policy solutions don't make it through the first time. The groundwork that we laid - and the feedback we received - ultimately strengthened the proposal, increasing bi-partisan support throughout the state. We are looking forward to working with partners on a similar proposal next session.

Moreover, we were able to start an important conversation at the state capitol about the importance of fighting hunger and increasing health outcomes through our state’s magnificent agriculture and food industries. This, to us was a win.

We wanted to take a moment to thank all of you for engaging your state legislators in support Harvest for Hope. Together, we generated hundreds of individual contacts, including letters, emails and phone calls.

Many of you took time out of your day to testify at the two agriculture committees hearings that were held. I'll never forget the bravery of one food pantry client who decided that telling her story and speaking up publicly in support of increasing the amount of fresh and healthy food in the emergency food system was important for her to do despite the possible stigma of being perceived as "one of those people" in her current job search.

People often say that families with low-incomes have no special interest lobbyists. That's not true. They have us and all of you.

Thank you for your advocacy.

You have inspired us.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time!

Posted by David Lee in on Mar 3, 2016 Tagged:

It's that time of year again - tax time! And this year, you can again turn tax time into dinner time through the Wisconsin Tax Check Off program. The program helps you easily donate a portion of your state tax refund to our network of regional food banks in Wisconsin.

It's really easy. If you use tax preparation software like TurboTax, an option to donate to local charities will come up toward the end of your state return. Simply select "Hunger Relief" or "Feeding America" and voila, you're done. TurboTax will even remember your donation for your charitable deduction next year!

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Funds will be distributed between Feeding Wisconsin food banks by the percentage of the state that each one serves.

Your continued generous support helped to enable over 40 million meals throughout the state in 2015, including just over 11.1 million pounds of healthy and nutritious food fresh from our Wisconsin farms. For every dollar that you donate, our food banks can provide at least 5 meals to the families that visit local food programs.

Harvest For Hope SB 474

Posted by David Lee in on Dec 5, 2015 Tagged:

On Friday, Senator Jerry Petrowski introduced SB 474, a state legislative proposal that would establish "Harvest for Hope," an exciting public-private partnership that would increase the supply of fresh, healthy food for the thousands of Wisconsin families that utilize our state’s food pantries.

Wisconsin boasts proud agricultural and food industries, growing and processing a diverse range of food products that feed the rest of the country and world. Yet at the same time, far too many of our friends and neighbors living in our state struggle with putting healthy, nutritious food on the table.

As we all know, on a cost per calorie basis, fresh, healthful food can be more expensive than less healthful options and this bind has a real effect on the families coming into our network’s partner food pantries.

According to the 2014 statewide survey of our clients, 82% of households report prioritizing cheap, unhealthy foods in order to make ends meet. And at the same time, nearly 53% of these households report having one member with heart disease and 34% report having one member with diabetes.

Furthermore, when clients were asked what they want but aren’t getting enough of, they listed fruits and vegetables as their top priority.

As a network, we are committed to increasing the amount of fresh and nutritious food available for the nearly 600,000 Wisconsinites utilizing the 1200 food pantries that receive food through our six regional food banks. In 2014, we distributed over 7 million pounds of fresh produce and we have ambitious goals to triple that amount in the next five years.

The Harvest for Hope program would help us toward that goal by increasing our ability to source and distribute high-quality, fresh Wisconsin grown food products to our network of partner food pantries in all 72 counties of our state.

By matching the private funds that we raise and invest in Harvest for Hope up to $250,000, the program will effectively double our impact, allowing us to source and distribute up to 2.5 million incremental pounds of fresh Wisconsin grown and processed food products.

And with more fresh, nutritious food in our system, food pantry clients will have the nutrition they need to get back on their feet.

Harvest for Hope is a great example of how we can all come together through public policy to fight hunger, help rural communities and support our state’s food industry at the same time.

45 Million Meals in 2015!

Posted by David Lee in on Dec 4, 2015 Tagged:

The preliminary numbers are in - in 2015, the Feeding Wisconsin network of food banks provided over 45 million meals to the people and families utilizing our range of services. This is up about 7% from the nearly 41 million meals from last year.

From a produce standpoint, we grew our network's distribution of fresh agricultural products from 7 million pounds in 2014 to 11.1 million pounds in 2015 - a 58% increase!

There is still a long way to go in closing the meal gap in Wisconsin, but 7% growth is ahead of the annual pace we would need over the next ten years to accomplish this bold goal.

Ensuring that there is access to enough meals and benefits are only part of the equation and to address the other part, we are working on some exciting initiatives that we hope can shrink the overall need as well.

Thank you for your support in helping our food banks grow to meet the need. We are looking forward to an exciting 2016 with all of you!

Adam Ruins Food Drives

Posted by David Lee in on Dec 2, 2015 Tagged:

Do you watch the show "Adam Ruins Everything" on TruTV? It's sort of as if Alton Brown's "Good Eats" got mashed up with "Mythbusters." It's a fun little show, if you like having everything you hold dear ruined.

Well just in time for the holidays, Adam recently "ruined" canned food drives.

For the longest time, canned food drives were a pet peeve of mine (second to rolling luggage). Canned food drives are simply not efficient. As Adam points out, you need people to collect, sort and repackage random donations that don't fit together for a series of sensible, nutritious meals.

Furthermore, a person buying $25 of groceries at retail prices just doesn't go as far as $25 for a food bank, which can utilize its purchasing power and scale to not only buy more food but also more of the types of food it needs to fill out its inventory. The sad truth is that food from canned food drives amounts to less than 3% of our network's total food inventory.

But I changed my opinion when it occurred to me that canned food drives are simply a gateway that introduces people to a life of service in the fight against hunger; sort of basic training for hunger fighters.

How many of you learned about the issue and your local food bank after donating a bag of groceries. My bet is that more than a handful of you started volunteering at your local food bank with your friends. And then afterward, I bet some of you started writing letters to your legislators or joined a board.

Canned food drives are just the first step in this pipeline of engagement with our issue. And for that, the relative inefficiency of canned food drives pay off great dividends in the end.

Grand Opening in Little Chute

Posted by David Lee in on Oct 5, 2015 Tagged:

It seems like just yesterday we were all standing on an empty plot of land to break ground for Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin's new facility in Little Chute.

And now just a mere 6 months later, a beautiful, new 40,000 square foot facility is up and open to better serve the needs of the community.

I got to the facility a little early for the VIP reception tonight and it's really something to behold - a demonstration kitchen, clean room, banks of coolers and freezers to better hold fresh product, and aisles and aisles of rack space.

One thing was noticeably absent - the smell of ripening bananas.

I've been to a lot of food banks in my career and they all smell of the ethleyne gas that comes off of ripening fruit. And since the fragrance is strongest in bananas, all food banks (and fresh food warehouses for that matter) sort of smell like bananas. At this point, it sort of gives me a warm sense of comfort, like a home away from home.

The Little Chute facility smelled still smelled like fresh paint.

But it won't for long.

Once the work of storing and distributing food to our friends and neighbors in Northeast Wisconsin begins in earnest, that smell of fresh paint will slowly disappear and be replaced with that familiar smell of fighting hunger.

Creating a more equitable food system

Posted by David Lee in on Oct 4, 2015 Tagged:

Today was one of those kinds of days that I am lucky to have in my job. In the morning, I was in Mineral Point visiting our friends at the Wisconsin Innovation Kitchen (WINK) to hammer out some details in our partnership to extend the life of fresh, donated food from farmers and from the retail end.

WINK's partnership with the Hodan Center, where they not only provide a stream of funding but also meaningful work opportunities for the center's clients, is truly transformative and inspiring. I can't help but think that with more of the small to mid-tier processing outfits that also double as social enterprises, we would be able to more efficiently capture and preserve agricultural surplus for distribution.

Afterward, I hightailed it clear across the state to Sheboygan to keynote, “Access to Fresh, Nutritious Food for All,” a Wisconsin Local Food Network discussion at the John Michael Kohler Arts Center.

It was great to meet some of the local stakeholders – The Lakeshore Local Food Network (LLFN), the Sheboygan County Food Bank, Nourish Farms, the United Way of Sheboygan County, and many others – to learn about their collaboration through LLFN to create a more access to healthy food in the Lakeshore area. This is hard work and it was inspiring to hear about how they have engaged stakeholders and formulated their local plan to address the issue.

My talk was structured around my story of how I went from being a rural romantic to being a food advocate and hunger fighter and how, through this transformation, I’ve come to understand the challenges and opportunities in the quest for a better, more equitable food system.

In a nutshell, the “good food,” which I broadly define as food that is nutritious, produced and sold at fair prices, and good for people and the environment, is unfortunately still too costly for far too many people, including many of the people who grow it.

Creating a more equitable food system, one that provides good food for all in the 21st century, will require individuals and organizations to overcome the narcissism of small differences, which bedevils the development of the truly transformative partnerships that are necessary for a unified food movement.

And perhaps more importantly, for such a movement to really be effective it has to ensure that the people impacted by the lack of access to good food are also included at the table. It’s one thing to have advocates, professionals, and “experts” brainstorm and craft what an equitable food system looks like, but it’s completely another to have that ideal system be relevant and valuable to people living without access to good food. The people with the lived experiences are the real experts.

Food is incredibly powerful. It has the power to transform and build communities and it also has the power to divide and oppress. History is pretty clear about both of these points: great civilizations and cultures developed anywhere people could grow, cultivate, and share food and on the other hand, the production and consumption of food has been used to enslave and divide people, leading to disconnected and fragmented communities. In creating a more equitable food system, our challenge is to find a way to minimize its power to divide and hurt people and maximize its power to foster connections and heal communities.

Somebody to Wish Them Well

Posted by David Lee in on Oct 3, 2015 Tagged:

For the last three days, we have been training the new FoodShare Outreach staff that will be working in local communities throughout the state to provide high quality information and assistance to people who may be eligible for this important nutrition assistance program.

Today, our new staff shadowed one of the current Outreach Specialists and was given the opportunity to meet and talk to some potential customers at the River Food Pantry in Madison.

I was lucky enough to watch the staff as they met and spoke to the pantry customers and engage them in a friendly conversation about FoodShare. I saw smiles, caring, listening, and thankfulness.

As we left the pantry, I noticed this quote from Mother Teresa, which was printed out on nine sheets of 8x11 sheets of paper and pieced together on a huge piece of poster board.

It gave me the feels.

I had just seen our staff do that last thing, "...for somebody to smile and them, somebody to recognize them, somebody to wish them well."

This is at the heart of what our FoodShare Outreach specialists do: they provide connection. Sure, they help people learn about the FoodShare benefit and help them apply if they are interested, but beyond that, they provide some connection for people who may feel left behind.

The simple acts of smiling, saying hi, starting a conversation, and then wishing them well at the end, makes people feel seen and recognized. Far too many people who are working through tough times don't not have the simple luxury of someone taking care of them in that way.

I am proud to say that our Outreach staff throughout the state do not take this for granted. I saw them train it and practice it with my very eyes.

Photos on FoodShare Cards Don't Prevent Fraud

Posted by David Lee in on Sep 2, 2015 Tagged:

Chris Rickert from the Wisconsin State Journal had a couple of good pieces last week on AB 222, which would require photographs on FoodShare cards. As we shared with him in the piece, we oppose this provision because it would be expensive, almost impossible to implement effectively and ineffective antifraud measure.

The thing to remember is that FoodShare benefits are conferred to the whole family and so by putting a single person's photo on a card, it requires that one photographed person to do all of the food shopping for a family. This is not usually how families work and why such a provision is difficult to implement properly.

But beyond the implementation challenges, AB 222 falls short as a public policy measure to deter fraud. It might sound great but here is why they are ineffective at fighting fraud: the bulk of the very small amount of fraud in the program occurs when someone on FoodShare attempts to buy or sell their benefits to someone else. This requires another person to be complicit in an illegal transaction where a photo on a card would hardly be a deterrent.

If you read the stories of bad actors prosecuted for FoodShare trafficking, it will often involve the proprietor of a small convenience store cashing out a person's benefits by ringing up fake purchases (for example, a recent case in Philadelphia). A photo doesn't deter this sort of activity since the two people have already agreed to defraud the system.

We can all agree that fraud should not be tolerated. Public resources are precious and we deserve the right safeguards to ensure that benefits are being used properly. And the good news is that we have them. The USDA and the credit card companies that process EBT benefits already have very sophisticated data tracking and matching programs to root out this sort of fraud, investigate and prosecute the perpetrators. Does fraud and trafficking still occur? Yes, but at around 1.5%, it is at an all-time low and any corporation that could claim a 1.5% loss rate would celebrated.

As the recent implementation example in Massachusetts has shown, photos on FoodShare cards only cause more problems than they solve.

40 percent of our harvest is wasted annually

Posted by David Lee in on Sep 2, 2015 Tagged:

It's harvest time where the combines are rolling and the months of hard work of our farmer friends come into fruition. It's the time of year where we see and celebrate the magnificent yield of our bountiful fields.

And yet, 40% of that harvest will likely end up wasted at some point, either on its way to your refrigerator or after you've bought it. Some of it will even be left in the fields due to "unmarketability."

Food banks have long been at the forefront of diverting the bounty we produce into the homes of families with low-incomes for years.

Over the last year, our member food banks have diverted 19 million pounds of perfectly edible, fresh, nutritious food into the homes of our state's residents visiting our food pantries. This is good but we can still do more. We are working with many agricultural partners to ensure that all of the amazing products they produce find homes with families that may not have the resources to access them.

One such program is Second Harvest Foodbank of Southern Wisconsin's Field to Food Bank program, which works with farmers and processors to extend the harvest season by canning donated green beans, carrots and other crops. We are working on a couple of initiatives to scale this work throughout the state.

We also have another exciting partnership in the works with Wisconsin Innovation Kitchen to help us preserve donated fresh fruits and vegetables, which would increase the amount of fresh food available for our members to distribute.

Learn more about our agricultural programs by clicking here.

Incentives to Eat More Healthfully on FoodShare

Posted by David Lee in on Sep 1, 2015 Tagged:

A new study out on the dietary intake of SNAP (FoodShare in Wisconsin) participants coming out of the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity shows that while all Americans eat poorly, SNAP/FoodShare participants eat a little less healthfully than the norm.

The review showed that calorie intake between Americans with higher incomes and Americans with lower incomes was similar. This is really good news as it shows that important hunger fighting programs like SNAP/FoodShare are working as they are intended. The bad news though is that the quality of diets is a little worse.

On a scale of 100, the average American scored 58 while the average SNAP recipient scored a 47, both failing grades.

It's really important to note that it's not that people on SNAP make poor food choices. In fact, this review suggests that all Americans make suboptimal food choices whether or not you are on SNAP. It's just that when you are on SNAP, you have less money and resources to make the healthier food choices.

Fresh fruits and vegetables are more nutritionally dense and more expensive on a per calories basis whereas less expensive food is more calorically dense. It's a catch-22 that people with low-incomes just can't easily escape.

This is why legislative efforts like AB 177, which aim to restrict what families on FoodShare can purchase, don't actually address the problem and can unfortunately have the unintended consequences of decreasing the amount of resources people on FoodShare have to buy food.

We all want people eat more healthfully and the best way to achieve that goal for people on FoodShare is to provide the resources for them to actually make healthier choices by creating incentives to increase healthful food purchases without getting caught in that awful the catch-22.

This is why we support AB 292, the Grow Wisconsin initiative which aims to start a "double up bucks" style grant program to help people on FoodShare purchase more fresh, Wisconsin grown food products. This would not only provide FoodShare recipients with the additional incentives they need to spend on healthier products, but it would also boost the agricultural and the local food producing economies in our state.

Orange is the new black...for September

Posted by David Lee in on Sep 2, 2015 Tagged:

Just like pink is the color for breast cancer awareness and red the for AIDS awareness, orange is the symbolic color for hunger relief and September is the month for hunger action. This is why perhaps you've been seeing all of the calls to "go Orange" in September.

In this way, September is the month when orange really is the new black for hunger fighters (or given the fact that child nutrition programs are set to expire at the end of the month, perhaps orange is the new Child Nutrition Reauthorization?).

Throughout the month of September, our food banks and food banks across the nation in the Feeding America will be holding events for people to get involved and go orange. You can find a list of local Wisconsin events here on our events page.

In addition, here are a couple of quick ideas and links to some other fun ways you might want to get involved this month.

Wear orange on Thursday, 9/3, take a photo, post it to social media and tag your local food bank.
Donate a "Spoon Selfie" for "Spoontember" (bonus points for selfie stick usage).
Donate your social media to the cause on Hunger Action Day by joining our Thunderclap.
The new food insecurity numbers will be released next week. Join this USDA webinar on 9/9 at Noon CST to learn how we did last year to combat hunger.
Join Mario Batali in a Virtual Town Hall on Thursday, 9/10 at 3 pm CST to discuss Child Nutrition Reauthorization.
Sign our petition calling on Congress for strong child nutrition programs and share it on your social media with all of your friends.
Snap a picture of your #RuralViews and #StompinGrounds and post to social media to enter Badgerland Financial's #LoveMyLand photo contest. Every entry equals $1 for our food banks and over the course of two months over 3,000 meal equivalents have been donated along with some unbelievably beautiful photos of our state.
Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Instagram.

Personally, I'm looking forward to the Virtual Town Hall with Mario Batali on 9/10 to chat about Child Nutrition Reauthorization. Maybe we can make #OrangeIsTheNewCNR a thing?

Making Hunger Mind Friendly

Posted by David Lee in on Aug 1, 2015 Tagged:

Earlier in the year, I was honored to have been selected as one of fifteen non-profit leaders to participate in the American Express - Aspen Institute Academy 2.0 which took place last week in Aspen, CO. It was a rich, inspiring, and thought-provoking experience, and an unbelievable privilege to spend a week on their campus in Aspen to reflect on Good Society.

Arturo Gonzalez, one of the fellows in my cohort, and also an Atlas Corps fellow/hunger fighting compatriot at Kids' Food Basket, posted this lovely reflection on his experience at Aspen.

One of my big takeaways - of many - was a selection from Hernando de Soto's book, "The Mystery of Capital: Why Capitalism Triumphs in the West and Fails Everywhere Else." In it, he describes how a system of legal property makes capital "mind-friendly." He writes (emphasis mine):

"What distinguishes a good legal property system is that it is "mind friendly." It obtains and organizes knowledge about recorded assets in forms we can control. It collects, integrates, and coordinates not only data on assets and their potential but also our thoughts about them...The revolutionary contribution of an integrated property system is that it solves a basic problem of cognition. Our five senses are not sufficient for us to process the complex reality of an expanded market, much less a globalized one. We need to have the economic facts about ourselves and our resources boiled down to essentials that our minds can easily grasp."

In essence, a system of legal property helps us understand the concept of ownership. Understanding ownership helps us maximize economic value by enabling the efficient transfer of ownership.

This is fascinating to me: the process of making something nebulous - such as the right of ownership - concrete and therefore, transferable, making the invisible visible.

Big, hairy social problems are often invisible and therefore challenge our ability to adequately conceptualize them and have the "mind-friendly" frameworks to create solutions.

However, there are exciting examples of how we are beginning to create legal systems of property and exchange that make these problems more mind-friendly. For example, quantifying the social, health, and economic costs of food insecurity is an emerging field of research that aims to make hunger and food insecurity more mind-friendly. Conceptualizing food waste as wasting scarce resources like water, land, and labor is another way to look at the unbelievable energy cost of throwing away perfectly edible food.

This is exciting. By making what is invisible visible, we can more easily engage with these problems, attach costs and calculate value in order to guide our policy decisions. Continuing to find ways to help people have the frameworks to understand big, hairy societal problems, and to effectively communicate them to stakeholders, is key to our success to creating novel solutions for them.

Statewide FoodShare Outreach

Posted by David Lee in on Jul 4, 2015 Tagged:

One of our goals here at Feeding Wisconsin is to scale successful local programs. When we were developing our strategic plan, we conducted a needs assessment and FoodShare outreach was a critical gap, especially in the northern and western parts of the state.

Luckily, one of very own members, Second Harvest Foodbank of Southern Wisconsin, has been operating a best in class FoodShare Outreach program helping potentially eligible people in their service area qith friendly application information and assistance. Over the last 6 years, their program has connected Wisconsin families to benefits that has amounted to nearly 12 million meals and over $53 million of local economic impact. In fact, last year, their program won a national award from the Feeding America national office as one of the best outreach programs in the food bank network.

Working closely with our board and members, we quickly got to work to figure out how scale Second Harvest's program statewide.

And now just a few months later, we are thrilled to announce that FoodShare outreach will be expanding through the state later this year!

The first phase is already underway as we are beginning to transition the management and administration of the FoodShare Helpline (1-877-366-3635) from Second Harvest Foodbank of Southern Wisconsin to Feeding Wisconsin. This transition will also include adding new staff which will expand the Helpline's capacity to more effectively serve people living throughout the state with information and application assistance. We are planning for a seamless transition and callers should experience no interruption in service. In fact, the only change people should see will be a refreshed Get a Quest Card website and some new marketing materials.

The second phase will begin in the fall (September/October), when our members Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin and Feed My People Food Bank will start their FoodShare Outreach programs with on the ground, in-person outreach specialists in four counties in Northeastern Wisconsin and four counties in Western Wisconsin to help our friends and neighbors looking for FoodShare information and assistance. In Northeast Wisconsin, the in-person outreach will focus in the Fox Valley counties of Brown, Winnebago, Outagamie and Fond du Lac. In Western Wisconsin, in-person outreach will be available in Eau Claire, Chippewa, Clark and Dunn counties.

We are actively recruiting someone with program management and hunger-relief experience to help us manage and grow our program. If you happen to know (or be) a data-driven, outcome obsessed hunger fighter, here is the link to the job posting.

We are truly excited to be working with community organizations, partners, and agencies to bring this service statewide through the Helpline and with deeper, local engagement in the eight new counties.

A Visit to Fox Lake Correctional Facility

Posted by David Lee in on Jun 1, 2015 Tagged:

Earlier in the year, the Fox Lake Correctional Facility made a donation to Feed My People Food Bank, our member in Eau Claire. Not the facility or the staff at Fox Lake, but the inmates at the facility.

The donation was of the precious "unrestricted" variety - the food bank could use the donation however it saw fit - but the donors' one request was that at some point in the future, someone would attend one of their Diversity Enhancement Program seminars and tell the men what the donation was used for.

Emily Moore, the executive director of Feed My People Food Bank, asked if I could be free, given that it's a much shorter drive for me than for her, and I told her I'd be happy to do it.

The facility and I worked out a date and I forgot all about it until the date emerged on my calendar earlier this month. While I've given tons of presentations like these, I didn't quite know what to expect or how to structure this one.

Would these incarcerated men really be interested in the work of food banks and our vision for a hunger-free Wisconsin?

As it turns out, the answer to that question was a resounding yes.

I have no idea what any of these men did that led to their incarceration, but as a group, they were some of the most engaged and interested people that I have ever presented to. A handful of the guys were taking notes, scribbling down the factoids from my PowerPoint presentation, and their overall level of insight and inquiry really surprised me.

About halfway through through my presentation, I realized that I was on my humbling descent from the top of Mount Stupid.

You know Mount Stupid. If not, this graphic clearly describes the dynamic.

In April, I gave a keynote at The Regional Food Bank of Oklahoma's Partner Agency Conference where I talked about client empowerment, engaging the people we serve, their stories, insights and lived experiences, and having empathy for their journeys. It was a good talk and for a time, I thought I knew something.

Then just a few months later, there I was at the Fox Lake Correctional Facility talking to a group of men who may have been clients in the past and could be clients in the future, thinking that they wouldn't have anything interesting to say about hunger-relief.

My slow walk of shame down Mount Stupid began when I asked them how much more money they thought food insecure families would need to feel food secure. The answer is about $15. They said $14. Before learning the answer, I had pegged it at $25.

When I talked about the logistical challenges to food sourcing and distribution, they came up with innovative, exciting ideas and potential partnerships, ideas that I've only heard introduced at high-powered hunger-relief and food bank leader meetings and convenings.

One of the guys wondered why municipalities didn't convert abandoned and foreclosed lots into urban farms, which could then be a local economic development tool to grow fresh food to sell. This of course is exactly the initiative underway at Home GR/own Milwaukee.

Going into the talk, I had made the error of thinking that simply because these men had made a mistake that landed them in jail, they wouldn't have deep insights on solving societal problems.

Just because they were incarcerated doesn't mean they're not smart or interested or know a thing or two about getting food into people's bellies. In fact, they probably know more than most and are probably more invested in doing something about it.

Finally, at the bottom of Mount Stupid, I just shut up and listened to what they were eager to share with me and I learned about the potential for an internet farming army, how grocers can collaborate with federal nutrition programs and food pantries to change the emergency food system, and how an Uber model might change just in time delivery for food.

This engagement really gave me a new perspective on generosity. Not only are these men generous with their ideas, they are also more generous with their money, dollar for dollar, than many of us. They make under a dollar an hour for their labor inside the facility and they chose to collectively donate $1,000 to our Feed My People Food Bank. Even though they pooled their donations, the percentage of what they chose to give must be very high as a portion of what they make. The chaplain at Fox Lake, who runs this program, shared with me that on an annual basis, the men coming through her program give up to $12,000 to different causes.

When I left the facility, I had a new found appreciation for generosity and openness thanks to what the inmates showed me.

A Visit to Fox Lake Correctional Facility

Posted by David Lee in on Jun 1, 2015 Tagged:

Emily Moore, the executive director of Feed My People Food Bank, asked if I could be free, given that it's a much shorter drive for me than for her, and I told her I'd be happy to do it.

Would these incarcerated men really be interested in the work of food banks and our vision for a hunger-free Wisconsin?

As it turns out, the answer to that question was a resounding yes.

About halfway through through my presentation, I realized that I was on my humbling descent from the top of Mount Stupid.

You know Mount Stupid. If not, this graphic clearly describes the dynamic.

Going into the talk, I had made the error of thinking that simply because these men had made a mistake that landed them in jail, they wouldn't have deep insights on solving societal problems.

When I left the facility, I had a new found appreciation for generosity and openness thanks to what the inmates showed me.

A Visit to Fox Lake Correctional Facility

Posted by David Lee in on Jun 1, 2015 Tagged:

Emily Moore, the executive director of Feed My People Food Bank, asked if I could be free, given that it's a much shorter drive for me than for her, and I told her I'd be happy to do it.

Would these incarcerated men really be interested in the work of food banks and our vision for a hunger-free Wisconsin?

As it turns out, the answer to that question was a resounding yes.

About halfway through through my presentation, I realized that I was on my humbling descent from the top of Mount Stupid.

You know Mount Stupid. If not, this graphic clearly describes the dynamic.

Going into the talk, I had made the error of thinking that simply because these men had made a mistake that landed them in jail, they wouldn't have deep insights on solving societal problems.

When I left the facility, I had a new found appreciation for generosity and openness thanks to what the inmates showed me.

A Visit to Fox Lake Correctional Facility

Posted by David Lee in on Jun 1, 2015 Tagged:

Emily Moore, the executive director of Feed My People Food Bank, asked if I could be free, given that it's a much shorter drive for me than for her, and I told her I'd be happy to do it.

Would these incarcerated men really be interested in the work of food banks and our vision for a hunger-free Wisconsin?

As it turns out, the answer to that question was a resounding yes.

About halfway through through my presentation, I realized that I was on my humbling descent from the top of Mount Stupid.

You know Mount Stupid. If not, this graphic clearly describes the dynamic.

Going into the talk, I had made the error of thinking that simply because these men had made a mistake that landed them in jail, they wouldn't have deep insights on solving societal problems.

When I left the facility, I had a new found appreciation for generosity and openness thanks to what the inmates showed me.

A Visit to Fox Lake Correctional Facility

Posted by David Lee in on Jun 1, 2015 Tagged:

Emily Moore, the executive director of Feed My People Food Bank, asked if I could be free, given that it's a much shorter drive for me than for her, and I told her I'd be happy to do it.

Would these incarcerated men really be interested in the work of food banks and our vision for a hunger-free Wisconsin?

As it turns out, the answer to that question was a resounding yes.

About halfway through through my presentation, I realized that I was on my humbling descent from the top of Mount Stupid.

You know Mount Stupid. If not, this graphic clearly describes the dynamic.

Going into the talk, I had made the error of thinking that simply because these men had made a mistake that landed them in jail, they wouldn't have deep insights on solving societal problems.

When I left the facility, I had a new found appreciation for generosity and openness thanks to what the inmates showed me.

Groundbreaking in Little Chute, WI

Posted by David Lee in on May 4, 2015 Tagged:

While the weather forecasts were threatening earlier in the week, the day couldn't have been more stunning for our member Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin to break ground on their their new facility in Little Chute/Appleton, WI!

Members of the board, the local community, partner food programs, and local and state officials including Representative Jim Steineke were in attendance to mark this new beginning to help expand our efforts in the northeastern portion of the state.

This new 40,000 square foot warehouse and office will expand our warehouse capacity in the state by about 20% and will help us more effectively store, warehouse, and distribute the food we will need to close our state's meal gap over the next decade (more exciting news on this to come soon!).

While they broke ground on the construction, the capital campaign is just kicking into high gear. Learn more about how you can get involved by click here.

Groundbreaking in Little Chute, WI

Posted by David Lee in on May 4, 2015 Tagged:

While they broke ground on the construction, the capital campaign is just kicking into high gear. Learn more about how you can get involved by click here.

Proposed Restrictions in FoodShare

Posted by David Lee in on Apr 4, 2015 Tagged:

A couple of weeks ago, the internet was set ablaze by Gwyneth Paltrow attempting the SNAP Challenge, which asks people to procure and document their food intake for a week on a $29, an average week of SNAP/FoodShare benefits. Of all of the commentary, this is probably the smartest pieces that I read about it.

I bring it up today since our state assembly will be holding a hearing on AB 177, a bill that would restrict the ability of FoodShare recipients to 67% of the WIC-approved food items, with the addition of some proteins and canned white potatoes. If passed, the state would still have to obtain a waiver from the USDA, which operates the program, and DHS would have to foot the bill to implement it.

Healthy eating is an important basis for good health and we should do everything possible to help all people to eat healthfully. However, this bill does not address the biggest barrier to people on FoodShare eating healthfully, which is cost.

Per calorie, healthy food is more expensive than other options. If you are on FoodShare, you have a limited amount of money to buy all of food you need. By restricting what people on FoodShare can buy to a list of approved foods, it effectively lowers the amount of money they have to procure all of the food they may need. It also takes away their ability to shop around, buy in bulk, and manage their own grocery budgets the way they see fit.

The way the state could help to increase healthy eating would be to incentivize healthy purchases by investing public dollars to fund a healthy eating incentive program. This type of positive intervention would incentivize healthy eating, address hunger, boost local economies, and begin to tackle the key issue that prevents people on FoodShare from eating more healthfully – cost.

In fact, USDA studies have shown that when incentivized, people on SNAP make better food buying decisions because they have more money.

For example, early results from the USDA Healthy Incentives Pilot, which provided a credit of .30 cents for every SNAP dollar spent on fruits and veggies, showed that it increased fruit and vegetable consumption by 25%.

The early results from this pilot points to encouraging and innovative ways that we could help incentivize good eating habits rather than penalizing suboptimal eating habits mostly brought on by a lack of resources.

To learn more about our position on FoodShare restrictions, click here.

Proposed Restrictions in FoodShare

Posted by David Lee in on Apr 4, 2015 Tagged:

In fact, USDA studies have shown that when incentivized, people on SNAP make better food buying decisions because they have more money.

To learn more about our position on FoodShare restrictions, click here.

Proposed Restrictions in FoodShare

Posted by David Lee in on Apr 4, 2015 Tagged:

In fact, USDA studies have shown that when incentivized, people on SNAP make better food buying decisions because they have more money.

To learn more about our position on FoodShare restrictions, click here.

Proposed Restrictions in FoodShare

Posted by David Lee in on Apr 4, 2015 Tagged:

In fact, USDA studies have shown that when incentivized, people on SNAP make better food buying decisions because they have more money.

To learn more about our position on FoodShare restrictions, click here.

Proposed Restrictions in FoodShare

Posted by David Lee in on Apr 4, 2015 Tagged:

In fact, USDA studies have shown that when incentivized, people on SNAP make better food buying decisions because they have more money.

To learn more about our position on FoodShare restrictions, click here.

Proposed Restrictions in FoodShare

Posted by David Lee in on Apr 4, 2015 Tagged:

In fact, USDA studies have shown that when incentivized, people on SNAP make better food buying decisions because they have more money.

To learn more about our position on FoodShare restrictions, click here.

Proposed Restrictions in FoodShare

Posted by David Lee in on Apr 4, 2015 Tagged:

In fact, USDA studies have shown that when incentivized, people on SNAP make better food buying decisions because they have more money.

To learn more about our position on FoodShare restrictions, click here.

A different perspective on the new work requirement in FoodShare

Posted by David Lee in on Mar 2, 2015 Tagged:

Wednesday is the go-live date throughout the state for the full reimplementation of the work requirement for Able-Bodied Adults without Dependents (ABAWDs, or the government’s way of saying, "single adults without children who are not disabled") in the FoodShare program. If they aren’t exempt and they don’t meet the requirement of being engaged in at least 20 hours of work, workfare or job training/search, they will be limited to three months of FoodShare benefits every three years.

Who would be opposed to this? Work is great. It gives people purpose and we all know that a good paying job is undoubtedly the best tool in the fight against hunger.

And besides, with our state’s Midwestern work ethic, hard work is one of our fundamental values. In fact, it’s so core to us that a majority of the people in Wisconsin enrolled in FoodShare live in working families (53%). This is higher than the national average of 42%. This tracks with our study that showed that within the last year, 59% of people who visited our food programs report having at least one member in the family working for pay.

So the majority of the people who need food assistance are just like us, they work, work hard, but just are not paid enough or have enough hours to pay all the bills. As for the people who aren’t working, it has been suggested that they don’t want to work and that reinstating this requirement this is the solution to that problem.

While that might be true for some, let me tell you a story about my wife. She grew up on a farm in Central Wisconsin and she knows hard work. It is deeply encoded into her DNA from those 5 am mornings milking cows before school and the summers weeding in ginseng gardens baking underneath those black tarps soaking up the heat from the summer sun.

That work ethic helped her to lead her high school to the state championship in volleyball, become valedictorian, go on to college and then get a PhD (with no debt – more Wisconsin values). But then, all hell broke loose with her body. Her jaw locked up. Her back seized up. And she basically spent the better part of five years in pain, unable to talk, barely able to move and definitely unable to work.

We went through doctor after doctor and no one could help or diagnose her and thus, no disability and no help.

Thankfully, I had a job that could support us both through her physical therapy and recuperation. We have been extremely lucky.

However, had we not been married, she would have been one an ABAWD. And if the requirement had not been waived during that time, she would have only had a total of six months of food stamps during the last five years as one of the only public benefits available to her.

I am not saying that all 38,000 of the projected people that will be affected by the reimplementation of the work requirement are cases like my wife but I am willing to bet that there are more than a few. Life can be really hard, despite our best intentions. And that’s why we think it’s important to better understand the ABAWD population, their challenges and needs, and how best to ensure that they have the help they need to improve their lives.

My wife has made such miraculous progress over the last five years. She’s had some help from some great people but she’s mostly figured it out herself and worked with dogged determination to get better. She’s worked harder at this than most people work at their jobs. That’s that Midwestern work ethic for you.

A different perspective on the new work requirement in FoodShare

Posted by David Lee in on Mar 2, 2015 Tagged:

Who would be opposed to this? Work is great. It gives people purpose and we all know that a good paying job is undoubtedly the best tool in the fight against hunger.

We went through doctor after doctor and no one could help or diagnose her and thus, no disability and no help.

Thankfully, I had a job that could support us both through her physical therapy and recuperation. We have been extremely lucky.

SNAP works and we should protect it from harmful changes

Posted by David Lee in on Mar 4, 2015 Tagged: AmeriCorps

If there was a private benefit program that could deliver a payment accuracy rate of 97% and a fraud rate of 1.5%, while also generating local economic impact, we would be extolling its success and attempting to replicate its processes to save money and deliver better service.

The corporate leaders running this program would, under no circumstances, try to dismantle the program or enact policy changes to make the program less effective, have more fraud and less accuracy. That wouldn’t be responsible.

So, why are our policymakers trying to do this with the SNAP program (formerly food stamps, FoodShare here in Wisconsin)?

Over the last few years, the program has seen unprecedented attacks and cuts.

Right here in Wisconsin, families utilizing the program to help them buy groceries so that they have the food they need to get back to work or learn in school have had to deal with two cuts in benefits and starting in April single-adults without children will soon be limited to 90 days of benefits every three years. An expensive and redundant drug testing proposal has been put forth which would increase the barriers to enrolling in the program.

And it’s not just our state. Our members of Congress are getting in on the act, too.

Earlier this week, the House introduced and passed a budget resolution which includes a proposal to cap funding and give control to the states to administer the program, otherwise known as block granting. This would give states a set amount of money and when those program funds run out, they run out. Block granting SNAP would severely limit the ability for the program to effectively respond to changes in need and could potentially create waiting lists for people who need food.

Every state is different and ensuring that states have the control to administer the program to fit the needs of their citizens is a good idea and that's exactly how the program is currently being administered. Our state - and every other state - has complete control over how it administers the program so long as it is compliant with Federal rules. With that comes the guarantee that funds will be available as need rises and retracts. This is a good thing - when times are good participation is down and when times get tough, the program can expand to catch those in need.

I understand many of the concerns that people have with the program. 47 million Americans enrolled in the program is a lot and our national budget priorities need to be addressed. I agree and I think it's important to put these concerns in context. The program grew so aggressively in the wake of the biggest economic downturn since the Great Depression, not because the program is somehow flawed or too easy to access.

And yet, with that growth, SNAP spending still amounted to less than 1% of the federal budget. Furthermore, SNAP has already experienced three rounds of cuts in last few years.

The good news is that as the economy has slowly begun to recover, participation in the SNAP program has finally begun to decline. This good because it means more people are naturally leaving the program because they have jobs.

And rather than making it harder for people to access the program by imposing arbitrary caps and limits, policymakers should focus on ways to effectively decrease SNAP enrollment by investing in job training that provides people with the right pathway to skills so that they can buy groceries with a paycheck from a good paying job.

As a safety net, SNAP does exactly what it was designed to do: provide people with low-incomes some help to buy the food they need to continue improving their lives.

SNAP works and we should protect it from harmful changes

Posted by David Lee in on Mar 4, 2015 Tagged:

So, why are our policymakers trying to do this with the SNAP program (formerly food stamps, FoodShare here in Wisconsin)?

Over the last few years, the program has seen unprecedented attacks and cuts.

And it’s not just our state. Our members of Congress are getting in on the act, too.

And yet, with that growth, SNAP spending still amounted to less than 1% of the federal budget. Furthermore, SNAP has already experienced three rounds of cuts in last few years.

As a safety net, SNAP does exactly what it was designed to do: provide people with low-incomes some help to buy the food they need to continue improving their lives.

SNAP works and we should protect it from harmful changes

Posted by David Lee in on Mar 4, 2015 Tagged:

So, why are our policymakers trying to do this with the SNAP program (formerly food stamps, FoodShare here in Wisconsin)?

Over the last few years, the program has seen unprecedented attacks and cuts.

And it’s not just our state. Our members of Congress are getting in on the act, too.

And yet, with that growth, SNAP spending still amounted to less than 1% of the federal budget. Furthermore, SNAP has already experienced three rounds of cuts in last few years.

As a safety net, SNAP does exactly what it was designed to do: provide people with low-incomes some help to buy the food they need to continue improving their lives.

SNAP works and we should protect it from harmful changes

Posted by David Lee in on Mar 4, 2015 Tagged:

So, why are our policymakers trying to do this with the SNAP program (formerly food stamps, FoodShare here in Wisconsin)?

Over the last few years, the program has seen unprecedented attacks and cuts.

And it’s not just our state. Our members of Congress are getting in on the act, too.

And yet, with that growth, SNAP spending still amounted to less than 1% of the federal budget. Furthermore, SNAP has already experienced three rounds of cuts in last few years.

As a safety net, SNAP does exactly what it was designed to do: provide people with low-incomes some help to buy the food they need to continue improving their lives.

On the Road: National Anti-Hunger Policy Conference in DC

Posted by David Lee in on Mar 3, 2015 Tagged: AmeriCorps

After a couple of days working on produce capture in Fresno, I was off to DC for the National Anti-Hunger Policy Conference sponsored by Feeding America and the Food Research and Action Council (FRAC), which brought together nearly 1,000 (!) anti-hunger advocates across the nation for networking, learning, practice sharing, and a day on the Hill.

This is a conference that I had the honor of serving as a co-chair with the current Executive Director at Feeding Pennsylvania when we were both at Feeding America. Small world.

On Sunday, I had the pleasure to facilitate two discussions on SNAP (known in Wisconsin as FoodShare). For a program that works exactly as it is designed to do and is so successful in responding to fluctuating economic conditions, it catches a lot of bad press. I’m beginning to wonder if it’s just our collective disbelief that the government can actually create and run a program that works.

While the rates of fraud and abuse are extremely small, the stories of misuse of the program make us feel angry because we feel taken advantage of and that's a terrible feeling. But our response shouldn't be, let's attack the program. For example, when we see someone stealing from a business, we say, "That person should be arrested," not, "Let's get rid of businesses."

On Tuesday, I was joined by Ossie Kendrix, the Partnership Development Manager at our food bank in Milwaukee, and Peter Bakken, the Public Policy Coordinator at the Wisconsin Council of Churches, as we made visits to our entire Wisconsin Congressional delegation. We talked to members and staff about building and maintaining strong hunger-relief programs and partnerships between the public sector and private charity.

This partnership would include a strong SNAP/FoodShare program that is administered efficiently and effectively, Child Nutrition programs that maintain high nutrition standards that are easy for schools and NGOs to administer and that effectively reach children when they are most at-risk of hunger, and a tax framework that helps to incentivize charitable donations.

It would have been great to have you join us on these visits. It’s really important that our Members of Congress hear from you. Thankfully, it doesn’t just have to be in DC – you can connect with them on issues like this over the phone, email, or even social media. Here’s what you can do today:

If you are interested in learning more about these issues, please sign up for our newsletter to stay abreast on our latest news, updates, and actions
You can learn more about how these policy issues affect families at-risk of hunger
Contact us with any questions you might have about any of these issues

On the Road: National Anti-Hunger Policy Conference in DC

Posted by David Lee in on Mar 3, 2015 Tagged:

This is a conference that I had the honor of serving as a co-chair with the current Executive Director at Feeding Pennsylvania when we were both at Feeding America. Small world.

If you are interested in learning more about these issues, please sign up for our newsletter to stay abreast on our latest news, updates, and actions
You can learn more about how these policy issues affect families at-risk of hunger
Contact us with any questions you might have about any of these issues

On the Road: National Anti-Hunger Policy Conference in DC

Posted by David Lee in on Mar 3, 2015 Tagged:

This is a conference that I had the honor of serving as a co-chair with the current Executive Director at Feeding Pennsylvania when we were both at Feeding America. Small world.

If you are interested in learning more about these issues, please sign up for our newsletter to stay abreast on our latest news, updates, and actions
You can learn more about how these policy issues affect families at-risk of hunger
Contact us with any questions you might have about any of these issues

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 3

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged: OrangeIsTheNewCNR

It was great to spend day three at the Community Food Bank in Fresno. When I was working for the Feeding America, visiting food banks across the nation was one of my favorite parts of my job.

There’s a saw in food banking that goes, “If you’ve seen one food bank, you’ve seen one food bank.” And while each food bank is certainly unique in its own way (I've never seen a sign in a warehouse with kid Michael Jackson reminding staff and volunteers to count their inventory, for example), there is a feeling, rhythm and smell (usually of bananas and other fruit) that is consistent throughout the nation and that somehow feels like home to me.

It was also great to see my friend Andy Souza, the food bank’s CEO, who addressed our group. He highlighted the brutal irony that while Fresno is the fresh market basket of the nation, it is also one of the nation’s most food insecure areas.

So, the people who grow most of our nation’s fresh food supply are sometimes the very people who need the services of the food bank.

This is no different than in Wisconsin where many of our rural areas have rates of food insecurity, some as high as some of our urban areas. According to our analysis, food insecurity rates in the urban and metro areas of Wisconsin (12%, or about 380,000 people) match the rates of food insecurity in the smaller towns and rural areas of our state (11%, or about 326,000 people). Complicating the issue is that rural areas often the infrastructure of services and are more difficult to reach. This has deep implications on how we orient our services to better reach our rural areas.

Listening to Andy talk about how they transformed the way they do business to better meet the nutritional needs of their clients was inspiring. In the last four years, the Fresno Community food bank went from distributing 3 million pounds of fresh produce to over 20 million. They are well on their way to achieving a product mix of 50% fresh produce leaving their warehouse.

It can be done.

The one thing that I kept hearing is that there is so much food out there. We just have to build the resources and infrastructure to get it. In order to do that, we have to surmount these challenges:

Transportation and distribution: Our biggest choke points are getting the product out of the fields and then into the homes of the people visiting our pantries. Trucking is expensive and with nearly 350,000 open CDL jobs in the nation, companies can't seem to hire enough truck drivers. And on the distribution end, with the limited life of the product when we get it, we have to be able to move it fast or move it into a value-added processing supply chain to extend the life.
Cost of recovery: Donating fresh produce can be expensive when you add up the costs of totes, bins, bags, labor and trucks. Often, it can just be simpler to plow perfectly edible market seconds under. Additionally, the volatility and unpredictability of harvests make budgeting for this source of food difficult. Remember when the green beans came in early in Wisconsin last summer?
Aftermarket competition: Market seconds are perfectly edible and nutritious food products and the market is noticing. Other secondary and tertiary markets are creating some upward price pressure on our stream of fresh food.

We are preparing to release the outline of a pilot public-private partnership that would begin to test and address some of these challenges.

In the meantime, how can you help?

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 3

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged: Rural

It was great to spend day three at the Community Food Bank in Fresno. When I was working for the Feeding America, visiting food banks across the nation was one of my favorite parts of my job.

So, the people who grow most of our nation’s fresh food supply are sometimes the very people who need the services of the food bank.

It can be done.

The one thing that I kept hearing is that there is so much food out there. We just have to build the resources and infrastructure to get it. In order to do that, we have to surmount these challenges:

Transportation and distribution: Our biggest choke points are getting the product out of the fields and then into the homes of the people visiting our pantries. Trucking is expensive and with nearly 350,000 open CDL jobs in the nation, companies can't seem to hire enough truck drivers. And on the distribution end, with the limited life of the product when we get it, we have to be able to move it fast or move it into a value-added processing supply chain to extend the life.
Cost of recovery: Donating fresh produce can be expensive when you add up the costs of totes, bins, bags, labor and trucks. Often, it can just be simpler to plow perfectly edible market seconds under. Additionally, the volatility and unpredictability of harvests make budgeting for this source of food difficult. Remember when the green beans came in early in Wisconsin last summer?
Aftermarket competition: Market seconds are perfectly edible and nutritious food products and the market is noticing. Other secondary and tertiary markets are creating some upward price pressure on our stream of fresh food.

We are preparing to release the outline of a pilot public-private partnership that would begin to test and address some of these challenges.

In the meantime, how can you help?

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 3

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

It was great to spend day three at the Community Food Bank in Fresno. When I was working for the Feeding America, visiting food banks across the nation was one of my favorite parts of my job.

So, the people who grow most of our nation’s fresh food supply are sometimes the very people who need the services of the food bank.

It can be done.

The one thing that I kept hearing is that there is so much food out there. We just have to build the resources and infrastructure to get it. In order to do that, we have to surmount these challenges:

Transportation and distribution: Our biggest choke points are getting the product out of the fields and then into the homes of the people visiting our pantries. Trucking is expensive and with nearly 350,000 open CDL jobs in the nation, companies can't seem to hire enough truck drivers. And on the distribution end, with the limited life of the product when we get it, we have to be able to move it fast or move it into a value-added processing supply chain to extend the life.
Cost of recovery: Donating fresh produce can be expensive when you add up the costs of totes, bins, bags, labor and trucks. Often, it can just be simpler to plow perfectly edible market seconds under. Additionally, the volatility and unpredictability of harvests make budgeting for this source of food difficult. Remember when the green beans came in early in Wisconsin last summer?
Aftermarket competition: Market seconds are perfectly edible and nutritious food products and the market is noticing. Other secondary and tertiary markets are creating some upward price pressure on our stream of fresh food.

We are preparing to release the outline of a pilot public-private partnership that would begin to test and address some of these challenges.

In the meantime, how can you help?

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 3

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

It was great to spend day three at the Community Food Bank in Fresno. When I was working for the Feeding America, visiting food banks across the nation was one of my favorite parts of my job.

So, the people who grow most of our nation’s fresh food supply are sometimes the very people who need the services of the food bank.

It can be done.

The one thing that I kept hearing is that there is so much food out there. We just have to build the resources and infrastructure to get it. In order to do that, we have to surmount these challenges:

Transportation and distribution: Our biggest choke points are getting the product out of the fields and then into the homes of the people visiting our pantries. Trucking is expensive and with nearly 350,000 open CDL jobs in the nation, companies can't seem to hire enough truck drivers. And on the distribution end, with the limited life of the product when we get it, we have to be able to move it fast or move it into a value-added processing supply chain to extend the life.
Cost of recovery: Donating fresh produce can be expensive when you add up the costs of totes, bins, bags, labor and trucks. Often, it can just be simpler to plow perfectly edible market seconds under. Additionally, the volatility and unpredictability of harvests make budgeting for this source of food difficult. Remember when the green beans came in early in Wisconsin last summer?
Aftermarket competition: Market seconds are perfectly edible and nutritious food products and the market is noticing. Other secondary and tertiary markets are creating some upward price pressure on our stream of fresh food.

We are preparing to release the outline of a pilot public-private partnership that would begin to test and address some of these challenges.

In the meantime, how can you help?

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 3

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

It was great to spend day three at the Community Food Bank in Fresno. When I was working for the Feeding America, visiting food banks across the nation was one of my favorite parts of my job.

So, the people who grow most of our nation’s fresh food supply are sometimes the very people who need the services of the food bank.

It can be done.

The one thing that I kept hearing is that there is so much food out there. We just have to build the resources and infrastructure to get it. In order to do that, we have to surmount these challenges:

Transportation and distribution: Our biggest choke points are getting the product out of the fields and then into the homes of the people visiting our pantries. Trucking is expensive and with nearly 350,000 open CDL jobs in the nation, companies can't seem to hire enough truck drivers. And on the distribution end, with the limited life of the product when we get it, we have to be able to move it fast or move it into a value-added processing supply chain to extend the life.
Cost of recovery: Donating fresh produce can be expensive when you add up the costs of totes, bins, bags, labor and trucks. Often, it can just be simpler to plow perfectly edible market seconds under. Additionally, the volatility and unpredictability of harvests make budgeting for this source of food difficult. Remember when the green beans came in early in Wisconsin last summer?
Aftermarket competition: Market seconds are perfectly edible and nutritious food products and the market is noticing. Other secondary and tertiary markets are creating some upward price pressure on our stream of fresh food.

We are preparing to release the outline of a pilot public-private partnership that would begin to test and address some of these challenges.

In the meantime, how can you help?

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 3

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

It was great to spend day three at the Community Food Bank in Fresno. When I was working for the Feeding America, visiting food banks across the nation was one of my favorite parts of my job.

So, the people who grow most of our nation’s fresh food supply are sometimes the very people who need the services of the food bank.

It can be done.

The one thing that I kept hearing is that there is so much food out there. We just have to build the resources and infrastructure to get it. In order to do that, we have to surmount these challenges:

Transportation and distribution: Our biggest choke points are getting the product out of the fields and then into the homes of the people visiting our pantries. Trucking is expensive and with nearly 350,000 open CDL jobs in the nation, companies can't seem to hire enough truck drivers. And on the distribution end, with the limited life of the product when we get it, we have to be able to move it fast or move it into a value-added processing supply chain to extend the life.
Cost of recovery: Donating fresh produce can be expensive when you add up the costs of totes, bins, bags, labor and trucks. Often, it can just be simpler to plow perfectly edible market seconds under. Additionally, the volatility and unpredictability of harvests make budgeting for this source of food difficult. Remember when the green beans came in early in Wisconsin last summer?
Aftermarket competition: Market seconds are perfectly edible and nutritious food products and the market is noticing. Other secondary and tertiary markets are creating some upward price pressure on our stream of fresh food.

We are preparing to release the outline of a pilot public-private partnership that would begin to test and address some of these challenges.

In the meantime, how can you help?

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 3

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

It was great to spend day three at the Community Food Bank in Fresno. When I was working for the Feeding America, visiting food banks across the nation was one of my favorite parts of my job.

So, the people who grow most of our nation’s fresh food supply are sometimes the very people who need the services of the food bank.

It can be done.

The one thing that I kept hearing is that there is so much food out there. We just have to build the resources and infrastructure to get it. In order to do that, we have to surmount these challenges:

Transportation and distribution: Our biggest choke points are getting the product out of the fields and then into the homes of the people visiting our pantries. Trucking is expensive and with nearly 350,000 open CDL jobs in the nation, companies can't seem to hire enough truck drivers. And on the distribution end, with the limited life of the product when we get it, we have to be able to move it fast or move it into a value-added processing supply chain to extend the life.
Cost of recovery: Donating fresh produce can be expensive when you add up the costs of totes, bins, bags, labor and trucks. Often, it can just be simpler to plow perfectly edible market seconds under. Additionally, the volatility and unpredictability of harvests make budgeting for this source of food difficult. Remember when the green beans came in early in Wisconsin last summer?
Aftermarket competition: Market seconds are perfectly edible and nutritious food products and the market is noticing. Other secondary and tertiary markets are creating some upward price pressure on our stream of fresh food.

We are preparing to release the outline of a pilot public-private partnership that would begin to test and address some of these challenges.

In the meantime, how can you help?

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 3

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

It was great to spend day three at the Community Food Bank in Fresno. When I was working for the Feeding America, visiting food banks across the nation was one of my favorite parts of my job.

So, the people who grow most of our nation’s fresh food supply are sometimes the very people who need the services of the food bank.

It can be done.

The one thing that I kept hearing is that there is so much food out there. We just have to build the resources and infrastructure to get it. In order to do that, we have to surmount these challenges:

Transportation and distribution: Our biggest choke points are getting the product out of the fields and then into the homes of the people visiting our pantries. Trucking is expensive and with nearly 350,000 open CDL jobs in the nation, companies can't seem to hire enough truck drivers. And on the distribution end, with the limited life of the product when we get it, we have to be able to move it fast or move it into a value-added processing supply chain to extend the life.
Cost of recovery: Donating fresh produce can be expensive when you add up the costs of totes, bins, bags, labor and trucks. Often, it can just be simpler to plow perfectly edible market seconds under. Additionally, the volatility and unpredictability of harvests make budgeting for this source of food difficult. Remember when the green beans came in early in Wisconsin last summer?
Aftermarket competition: Market seconds are perfectly edible and nutritious food products and the market is noticing. Other secondary and tertiary markets are creating some upward price pressure on our stream of fresh food.

We are preparing to release the outline of a pilot public-private partnership that would begin to test and address some of these challenges.

In the meantime, how can you help?

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 3

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

It was great to spend day three at the Community Food Bank in Fresno. When I was working for the Feeding America, visiting food banks across the nation was one of my favorite parts of my job.

So, the people who grow most of our nation’s fresh food supply are sometimes the very people who need the services of the food bank.

It can be done.

The one thing that I kept hearing is that there is so much food out there. We just have to build the resources and infrastructure to get it. In order to do that, we have to surmount these challenges:

Transportation and distribution: Our biggest choke points are getting the product out of the fields and then into the homes of the people visiting our pantries. Trucking is expensive and with nearly 350,000 open CDL jobs in the nation, companies can't seem to hire enough truck drivers. And on the distribution end, with the limited life of the product when we get it, we have to be able to move it fast or move it into a value-added processing supply chain to extend the life.
Cost of recovery: Donating fresh produce can be expensive when you add up the costs of totes, bins, bags, labor and trucks. Often, it can just be simpler to plow perfectly edible market seconds under. Additionally, the volatility and unpredictability of harvests make budgeting for this source of food difficult. Remember when the green beans came in early in Wisconsin last summer?
Aftermarket competition: Market seconds are perfectly edible and nutritious food products and the market is noticing. Other secondary and tertiary markets are creating some upward price pressure on our stream of fresh food.

We are preparing to release the outline of a pilot public-private partnership that would begin to test and address some of these challenges.

In the meantime, how can you help?

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 3

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

It was great to spend day three at the Community Food Bank in Fresno. When I was working for the Feeding America, visiting food banks across the nation was one of my favorite parts of my job.

So, the people who grow most of our nation’s fresh food supply are sometimes the very people who need the services of the food bank.

It can be done.

The one thing that I kept hearing is that there is so much food out there. We just have to build the resources and infrastructure to get it. In order to do that, we have to surmount these challenges:

Transportation and distribution: Our biggest choke points are getting the product out of the fields and then into the homes of the people visiting our pantries. Trucking is expensive and with nearly 350,000 open CDL jobs in the nation, companies can't seem to hire enough truck drivers. And on the distribution end, with the limited life of the product when we get it, we have to be able to move it fast or move it into a value-added processing supply chain to extend the life.
Cost of recovery: Donating fresh produce can be expensive when you add up the costs of totes, bins, bags, labor and trucks. Often, it can just be simpler to plow perfectly edible market seconds under. Additionally, the volatility and unpredictability of harvests make budgeting for this source of food difficult. Remember when the green beans came in early in Wisconsin last summer?
Aftermarket competition: Market seconds are perfectly edible and nutritious food products and the market is noticing. Other secondary and tertiary markets are creating some upward price pressure on our stream of fresh food.

We are preparing to release the outline of a pilot public-private partnership that would begin to test and address some of these challenges.

In the meantime, how can you help?

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 3

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

It was great to spend day three at the Community Food Bank in Fresno. When I was working for the Feeding America, visiting food banks across the nation was one of my favorite parts of my job.

So, the people who grow most of our nation’s fresh food supply are sometimes the very people who need the services of the food bank.

It can be done.

The one thing that I kept hearing is that there is so much food out there. We just have to build the resources and infrastructure to get it. In order to do that, we have to surmount these challenges:

Transportation and distribution: Our biggest choke points are getting the product out of the fields and then into the homes of the people visiting our pantries. Trucking is expensive and with nearly 350,000 open CDL jobs in the nation, companies can't seem to hire enough truck drivers. And on the distribution end, with the limited life of the product when we get it, we have to be able to move it fast or move it into a value-added processing supply chain to extend the life.
Cost of recovery: Donating fresh produce can be expensive when you add up the costs of totes, bins, bags, labor and trucks. Often, it can just be simpler to plow perfectly edible market seconds under. Additionally, the volatility and unpredictability of harvests make budgeting for this source of food difficult. Remember when the green beans came in early in Wisconsin last summer?
Aftermarket competition: Market seconds are perfectly edible and nutritious food products and the market is noticing. Other secondary and tertiary markets are creating some upward price pressure on our stream of fresh food.

We are preparing to release the outline of a pilot public-private partnership that would begin to test and address some of these challenges.

In the meantime, how can you help?

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 3

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

It was great to spend day three at the Community Food Bank in Fresno. When I was working for the Feeding America, visiting food banks across the nation was one of my favorite parts of my job.

So, the people who grow most of our nation’s fresh food supply are sometimes the very people who need the services of the food bank.

It can be done.

The one thing that I kept hearing is that there is so much food out there. We just have to build the resources and infrastructure to get it. In order to do that, we have to surmount these challenges:

Transportation and distribution: Our biggest choke points are getting the product out of the fields and then into the homes of the people visiting our pantries. Trucking is expensive and with nearly 350,000 open CDL jobs in the nation, companies can't seem to hire enough truck drivers. And on the distribution end, with the limited life of the product when we get it, we have to be able to move it fast or move it into a value-added processing supply chain to extend the life.
Cost of recovery: Donating fresh produce can be expensive when you add up the costs of totes, bins, bags, labor and trucks. Often, it can just be simpler to plow perfectly edible market seconds under. Additionally, the volatility and unpredictability of harvests make budgeting for this source of food difficult. Remember when the green beans came in early in Wisconsin last summer?
Aftermarket competition: Market seconds are perfectly edible and nutritious food products and the market is noticing. Other secondary and tertiary markets are creating some upward price pressure on our stream of fresh food.

We are preparing to release the outline of a pilot public-private partnership that would begin to test and address some of these challenges.

In the meantime, how can you help?

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 3

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

It was great to spend day three at the Community Food Bank in Fresno. When I was working for the Feeding America, visiting food banks across the nation was one of my favorite parts of my job.

So, the people who grow most of our nation’s fresh food supply are sometimes the very people who need the services of the food bank.

It can be done.

The one thing that I kept hearing is that there is so much food out there. We just have to build the resources and infrastructure to get it. In order to do that, we have to surmount these challenges:

Transportation and distribution: Our biggest choke points are getting the product out of the fields and then into the homes of the people visiting our pantries. Trucking is expensive and with nearly 350,000 open CDL jobs in the nation, companies can't seem to hire enough truck drivers. And on the distribution end, with the limited life of the product when we get it, we have to be able to move it fast or move it into a value-added processing supply chain to extend the life.
Cost of recovery: Donating fresh produce can be expensive when you add up the costs of totes, bins, bags, labor and trucks. Often, it can just be simpler to plow perfectly edible market seconds under. Additionally, the volatility and unpredictability of harvests make budgeting for this source of food difficult. Remember when the green beans came in early in Wisconsin last summer?
Aftermarket competition: Market seconds are perfectly edible and nutritious food products and the market is noticing. Other secondary and tertiary markets are creating some upward price pressure on our stream of fresh food.

We are preparing to release the outline of a pilot public-private partnership that would begin to test and address some of these challenges.

In the meantime, how can you help?

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 3

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

It was great to spend day three at the Community Food Bank in Fresno. When I was working for the Feeding America, visiting food banks across the nation was one of my favorite parts of my job.

So, the people who grow most of our nation’s fresh food supply are sometimes the very people who need the services of the food bank.

It can be done.

The one thing that I kept hearing is that there is so much food out there. We just have to build the resources and infrastructure to get it. In order to do that, we have to surmount these challenges:

Transportation and distribution: Our biggest choke points are getting the product out of the fields and then into the homes of the people visiting our pantries. Trucking is expensive and with nearly 350,000 open CDL jobs in the nation, companies can't seem to hire enough truck drivers. And on the distribution end, with the limited life of the product when we get it, we have to be able to move it fast or move it into a value-added processing supply chain to extend the life.
Cost of recovery: Donating fresh produce can be expensive when you add up the costs of totes, bins, bags, labor and trucks. Often, it can just be simpler to plow perfectly edible market seconds under. Additionally, the volatility and unpredictability of harvests make budgeting for this source of food difficult. Remember when the green beans came in early in Wisconsin last summer?
Aftermarket competition: Market seconds are perfectly edible and nutritious food products and the market is noticing. Other secondary and tertiary markets are creating some upward price pressure on our stream of fresh food.

We are preparing to release the outline of a pilot public-private partnership that would begin to test and address some of these challenges.

In the meantime, how can you help?

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 3

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

It was great to spend day three at the Community Food Bank in Fresno. When I was working for the Feeding America, visiting food banks across the nation was one of my favorite parts of my job.

So, the people who grow most of our nation’s fresh food supply are sometimes the very people who need the services of the food bank.

It can be done.

The one thing that I kept hearing is that there is so much food out there. We just have to build the resources and infrastructure to get it. In order to do that, we have to surmount these challenges:

Transportation and distribution: Our biggest choke points are getting the product out of the fields and then into the homes of the people visiting our pantries. Trucking is expensive and with nearly 350,000 open CDL jobs in the nation, companies can't seem to hire enough truck drivers. And on the distribution end, with the limited life of the product when we get it, we have to be able to move it fast or move it into a value-added processing supply chain to extend the life.
Cost of recovery: Donating fresh produce can be expensive when you add up the costs of totes, bins, bags, labor and trucks. Often, it can just be simpler to plow perfectly edible market seconds under. Additionally, the volatility and unpredictability of harvests make budgeting for this source of food difficult. Remember when the green beans came in early in Wisconsin last summer?
Aftermarket competition: Market seconds are perfectly edible and nutritious food products and the market is noticing. Other secondary and tertiary markets are creating some upward price pressure on our stream of fresh food.

We are preparing to release the outline of a pilot public-private partnership that would begin to test and address some of these challenges.

In the meantime, how can you help?

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 3

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

It was great to spend day three at the Community Food Bank in Fresno. When I was working for the Feeding America, visiting food banks across the nation was one of my favorite parts of my job.

So, the people who grow most of our nation’s fresh food supply are sometimes the very people who need the services of the food bank.

It can be done.

The one thing that I kept hearing is that there is so much food out there. We just have to build the resources and infrastructure to get it. In order to do that, we have to surmount these challenges:

Transportation and distribution: Our biggest choke points are getting the product out of the fields and then into the homes of the people visiting our pantries. Trucking is expensive and with nearly 350,000 open CDL jobs in the nation, companies can't seem to hire enough truck drivers. And on the distribution end, with the limited life of the product when we get it, we have to be able to move it fast or move it into a value-added processing supply chain to extend the life.
Cost of recovery: Donating fresh produce can be expensive when you add up the costs of totes, bins, bags, labor and trucks. Often, it can just be simpler to plow perfectly edible market seconds under. Additionally, the volatility and unpredictability of harvests make budgeting for this source of food difficult. Remember when the green beans came in early in Wisconsin last summer?
Aftermarket competition: Market seconds are perfectly edible and nutritious food products and the market is noticing. Other secondary and tertiary markets are creating some upward price pressure on our stream of fresh food.

We are preparing to release the outline of a pilot public-private partnership that would begin to test and address some of these challenges.

In the meantime, how can you help?

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 3

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

It was great to spend day three at the Community Food Bank in Fresno. When I was working for the Feeding America, visiting food banks across the nation was one of my favorite parts of my job.

So, the people who grow most of our nation’s fresh food supply are sometimes the very people who need the services of the food bank.

It can be done.

The one thing that I kept hearing is that there is so much food out there. We just have to build the resources and infrastructure to get it. In order to do that, we have to surmount these challenges:

Transportation and distribution: Our biggest choke points are getting the product out of the fields and then into the homes of the people visiting our pantries. Trucking is expensive and with nearly 350,000 open CDL jobs in the nation, companies can't seem to hire enough truck drivers. And on the distribution end, with the limited life of the product when we get it, we have to be able to move it fast or move it into a value-added processing supply chain to extend the life.
Cost of recovery: Donating fresh produce can be expensive when you add up the costs of totes, bins, bags, labor and trucks. Often, it can just be simpler to plow perfectly edible market seconds under. Additionally, the volatility and unpredictability of harvests make budgeting for this source of food difficult. Remember when the green beans came in early in Wisconsin last summer?
Aftermarket competition: Market seconds are perfectly edible and nutritious food products and the market is noticing. Other secondary and tertiary markets are creating some upward price pressure on our stream of fresh food.

We are preparing to release the outline of a pilot public-private partnership that would begin to test and address some of these challenges.

In the meantime, how can you help?

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 3

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

It was great to spend day three at the Community Food Bank in Fresno. When I was working for the Feeding America, visiting food banks across the nation was one of my favorite parts of my job.

So, the people who grow most of our nation’s fresh food supply are sometimes the very people who need the services of the food bank.

It can be done.

The one thing that I kept hearing is that there is so much food out there. We just have to build the resources and infrastructure to get it. In order to do that, we have to surmount these challenges:

Transportation and distribution: Our biggest choke points are getting the product out of the fields and then into the homes of the people visiting our pantries. Trucking is expensive and with nearly 350,000 open CDL jobs in the nation, companies can't seem to hire enough truck drivers. And on the distribution end, with the limited life of the product when we get it, we have to be able to move it fast or move it into a value-added processing supply chain to extend the life.
Cost of recovery: Donating fresh produce can be expensive when you add up the costs of totes, bins, bags, labor and trucks. Often, it can just be simpler to plow perfectly edible market seconds under. Additionally, the volatility and unpredictability of harvests make budgeting for this source of food difficult. Remember when the green beans came in early in Wisconsin last summer?
Aftermarket competition: Market seconds are perfectly edible and nutritious food products and the market is noticing. Other secondary and tertiary markets are creating some upward price pressure on our stream of fresh food.

We are preparing to release the outline of a pilot public-private partnership that would begin to test and address some of these challenges.

In the meantime, how can you help?

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 1 & 2

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged: Member News

I have to admit that as someone who grew up in San Francisco, I had a bit of hometown pride to learn on the first day of the conference that the Farm to Family program originated at the San Francisco Food Bank.

Gary Maxworthy, who was on the board at the food bank at the time, talked about starting the program and its humble beginnings of distributing culls of stone fruits from Fowler Packing in 1998 to moving 140 million pounds in over 20 fresh produce categories in 2014.

Back in 1998, no food bank wanted fresh fruits or vegetables. Remember, food banks were built to move dry, shelf stable goods. Now, 15 years later, fresh fruits and vegetables are a must.

And it happened really quickly - together, as a network of food banks, we are distributing just a shade under 1 billion pounds of fresh produce.

Yes, that’s a billion with a "b" and it represents nearly a fifth of the total national output.

On day two, we got to visit Fowler Packing, one of the original partners in the Farm to Family program. They grow, harvest, pack and ship throughout the country and the world nearly 70% of all of those Halo mandarin oranges that everybody loves.

We got to see their operations and learn how they make their culls for the Farm to Family program. The Halos that they are pulling for the food bank association have small, cosmetic blemishes or aren’t the right, uniform size for their specifications.

You can see in the pictures in the gallery – those bins hold tons (literally) of Halos. If less than 1 percent in each bin is imperfect for the market but otherwise perfectly edible and nutritious, that’s a lot of Halos coming to the food bank.

I was left in awe of the scale of our food system. It is incredible.

Here's my obligatory "Unwrapped" style video of Halos heading toward packing:

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 1 & 2

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Back in 1998, no food bank wanted fresh fruits or vegetables. Remember, food banks were built to move dry, shelf stable goods. Now, 15 years later, fresh fruits and vegetables are a must.

And it happened really quickly - together, as a network of food banks, we are distributing just a shade under 1 billion pounds of fresh produce.

Yes, that’s a billion with a "b" and it represents nearly a fifth of the total national output.

I was left in awe of the scale of our food system. It is incredible.

Here's my obligatory "Unwrapped" style video of Halos heading toward packing:

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference day 1 & 2

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Back in 1998, no food bank wanted fresh fruits or vegetables. Remember, food banks were built to move dry, shelf stable goods. Now, 15 years later, fresh fruits and vegetables are a must.

And it happened really quickly - together, as a network of food banks, we are distributing just a shade under 1 billion pounds of fresh produce.

Yes, that’s a billion with a "b" and it represents nearly a fifth of the total national output.

I was left in awe of the scale of our food system. It is incredible.

Here's my obligatory "Unwrapped" style video of Halos heading toward packing:

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 7, 2015 Tagged: Member News

Over the last few years, our food banks have been hard at work building the networks and partnerships to increase the amount of fresh produce that we are capturing and distributing. In FY 2014, we hit an all-time best distributing nearly 7 million pounds of fresh produce to the families visiting our pantries and meal programs. This is good but we can do better.

82% of the people visiting our programs report purchasing less expensive, “unhealthy” food to stretch their food budgets. This makes sense since calorically dense food is often cheaper than food that is more nutritionally dense.

These types of food – dry, shelf stable goods, bread and bakery – are generally also the kinds of food that are available in food banks. While these items are important staples in any home, fresh products like fruits, vegetables and proteins remain at a premium for our clients.

This is why we are focused on increasing the availability of these products – and in a big way. We hope to at least double our output in the next few years. And, with between 100 and 150 million pounds of fresh, nutritious agricultural surplus that is either left in our Wisconsin farm fields or unsold due to some other cosmetic imperfection, the food is out there.

The million dollar question is of course, how do we get after it?

Needless to say, I was excited to snag an invite to the Farm to Family conference being put on this week by our sister organization the California Association of Food Banks (CAFB) and sponsored by Walmart.

CAFB’s Farm to Family Program captures nearly 150 million pounds of fresh agricultural products grown in California and distributes them through its network of partner food banks.

Of course California, being the breadbasket of the nation, if not the world, has some unique advantages with regard to fresh produce. The conference was held in Fresno, which tops the nation in agricultural sales with $3.7 billion in annual agricultural sales. But the challenges they face – transportation, cost, and speed to distribution – are the same challenges that we face as well.

We have advantages too. We are in top ten of agricultural states in the nation and home to the second most organic farms in the nation, second only to California. Just think, if we could get just 10% of the 150 million pounds that are out there, that would more than double what we are distributing today.

So this week, I’ll be learning from CAFB about how to supercharge our Share Fresh Wisconsin program, helps farmers growing specialty market crops connect their surplus to our food banks and will be sharing the unique processes behind the innovative Field to Foodbank program that our member Second Harvest Foodbank of Southern Wisconsin has pioneered.

You can learn more about these programs here.

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 7, 2015 Tagged:

The million dollar question is of course, how do we get after it?

CAFB’s Farm to Family Program captures nearly 150 million pounds of fresh agricultural products grown in California and distributes them through its network of partner food banks.

You can learn more about these programs here.

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 7, 2015 Tagged:

The million dollar question is of course, how do we get after it?

CAFB’s Farm to Family Program captures nearly 150 million pounds of fresh agricultural products grown in California and distributes them through its network of partner food banks.

You can learn more about these programs here.

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 7, 2015 Tagged:

The million dollar question is of course, how do we get after it?

CAFB’s Farm to Family Program captures nearly 150 million pounds of fresh agricultural products grown in California and distributes them through its network of partner food banks.

You can learn more about these programs here.

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 7, 2015 Tagged:

The million dollar question is of course, how do we get after it?

CAFB’s Farm to Family Program captures nearly 150 million pounds of fresh agricultural products grown in California and distributes them through its network of partner food banks.

You can learn more about these programs here.

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 7, 2015 Tagged:

The million dollar question is of course, how do we get after it?

CAFB’s Farm to Family Program captures nearly 150 million pounds of fresh agricultural products grown in California and distributes them through its network of partner food banks.

You can learn more about these programs here.

On the Road: Farm to Family Conference

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 7, 2015 Tagged:

The million dollar question is of course, how do we get after it?

CAFB’s Farm to Family Program captures nearly 150 million pounds of fresh agricultural products grown in California and distributes them through its network of partner food banks.

You can learn more about these programs here.

Public Benefits Reform Informational Hearing

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged: Member News

The Assembly Public Benefits Reform committee held an informational hearing today at the Capitol, inviting representatives from the Wisconsin Departments of Children and Families (DCF), Health Services (DHS) and Workforce Development (DWD) to give the committee an overview of their programs and their efforts to combat waste, fraud and abuse.

Each of these departments administer important programs to fight hunger and poverty. And since they are publicly funded, it is important that they are operated as efficiently and effectively as possible to ensure that taxpayer dollars are being directed to helping families through tough times.

Based on the testimony and the questioning from the committee members, a couple of things jumped out at me as particularly interesting:

These state agencies are working hard to provide cost-effective services by rooting out internal inefficiencies. They are also invested in rooting out and recovering waste, fraud and abuse.
Most of the fraud in the system is perpetrated by bad actors on the provider side rather than on the client side. This tracks with national trends. Nationally, the rate of fraud in the FoodShare program is about 1.6%.
The goal of Wisconsin Works (W2, or TANF) is to connect people to family supporting jobs, yet the statutory income eligibility is 115% of the federal poverty line, which is an annual income of $23,104 for a family of three. That means that if a family of three had a single, full-time breadwinner making more than $11.55 they would no longer qualify for the program because a member would have a family supporting job.
The average state approval rates in the FoodShare program has been declining for the last few years and are tracking below national averages. Similarly, the rates of recertification approvals are curiously low when judged against national averages. Based on my previous work on the program nationally, this may be a symptom an administrative issue. I would be very curious to learn more about this.

What do you think? Watch the proceedings here on Wisconsin Eye.

Public Benefits Reform Informational Hearing

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged: Eastern Wisconsin

Based on the testimony and the questioning from the committee members, a couple of things jumped out at me as particularly interesting:

These state agencies are working hard to provide cost-effective services by rooting out internal inefficiencies. They are also invested in rooting out and recovering waste, fraud and abuse.
Most of the fraud in the system is perpetrated by bad actors on the provider side rather than on the client side. This tracks with national trends. Nationally, the rate of fraud in the FoodShare program is about 1.6%.
The goal of Wisconsin Works (W2, or TANF) is to connect people to family supporting jobs, yet the statutory income eligibility is 115% of the federal poverty line, which is an annual income of $23,104 for a family of three. That means that if a family of three had a single, full-time breadwinner making more than $11.55 they would no longer qualify for the program because a member would have a family supporting job.
The average state approval rates in the FoodShare program has been declining for the last few years and are tracking below national averages. Similarly, the rates of recertification approvals are curiously low when judged against national averages. Based on my previous work on the program nationally, this may be a symptom an administrative issue. I would be very curious to learn more about this.

What do you think? Watch the proceedings here on Wisconsin Eye.

Public Benefits Reform Informational Hearing

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

Based on the testimony and the questioning from the committee members, a couple of things jumped out at me as particularly interesting:

These state agencies are working hard to provide cost-effective services by rooting out internal inefficiencies. They are also invested in rooting out and recovering waste, fraud and abuse.
Most of the fraud in the system is perpetrated by bad actors on the provider side rather than on the client side. This tracks with national trends. Nationally, the rate of fraud in the FoodShare program is about 1.6%.
The goal of Wisconsin Works (W2, or TANF) is to connect people to family supporting jobs, yet the statutory income eligibility is 115% of the federal poverty line, which is an annual income of $23,104 for a family of three. That means that if a family of three had a single, full-time breadwinner making more than $11.55 they would no longer qualify for the program because a member would have a family supporting job.
The average state approval rates in the FoodShare program has been declining for the last few years and are tracking below national averages. Similarly, the rates of recertification approvals are curiously low when judged against national averages. Based on my previous work on the program nationally, this may be a symptom an administrative issue. I would be very curious to learn more about this.

What do you think? Watch the proceedings here on Wisconsin Eye.

Public Benefits Reform Informational Hearing

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

Based on the testimony and the questioning from the committee members, a couple of things jumped out at me as particularly interesting:

These state agencies are working hard to provide cost-effective services by rooting out internal inefficiencies. They are also invested in rooting out and recovering waste, fraud and abuse.
Most of the fraud in the system is perpetrated by bad actors on the provider side rather than on the client side. This tracks with national trends. Nationally, the rate of fraud in the FoodShare program is about 1.6%.
The goal of Wisconsin Works (W2, or TANF) is to connect people to family supporting jobs, yet the statutory income eligibility is 115% of the federal poverty line, which is an annual income of $23,104 for a family of three. That means that if a family of three had a single, full-time breadwinner making more than $11.55 they would no longer qualify for the program because a member would have a family supporting job.
The average state approval rates in the FoodShare program has been declining for the last few years and are tracking below national averages. Similarly, the rates of recertification approvals are curiously low when judged against national averages. Based on my previous work on the program nationally, this may be a symptom an administrative issue. I would be very curious to learn more about this.

What do you think? Watch the proceedings here on Wisconsin Eye.

Public Benefits Reform Informational Hearing

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

Based on the testimony and the questioning from the committee members, a couple of things jumped out at me as particularly interesting:

These state agencies are working hard to provide cost-effective services by rooting out internal inefficiencies. They are also invested in rooting out and recovering waste, fraud and abuse.
Most of the fraud in the system is perpetrated by bad actors on the provider side rather than on the client side. This tracks with national trends. Nationally, the rate of fraud in the FoodShare program is about 1.6%.
The goal of Wisconsin Works (W2, or TANF) is to connect people to family supporting jobs, yet the statutory income eligibility is 115% of the federal poverty line, which is an annual income of $23,104 for a family of three. That means that if a family of three had a single, full-time breadwinner making more than $11.55 they would no longer qualify for the program because a member would have a family supporting job.
The average state approval rates in the FoodShare program has been declining for the last few years and are tracking below national averages. Similarly, the rates of recertification approvals are curiously low when judged against national averages. Based on my previous work on the program nationally, this may be a symptom an administrative issue. I would be very curious to learn more about this.

What do you think? Watch the proceedings here on Wisconsin Eye.

Public Benefits Reform Informational Hearing

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

Based on the testimony and the questioning from the committee members, a couple of things jumped out at me as particularly interesting:

These state agencies are working hard to provide cost-effective services by rooting out internal inefficiencies. They are also invested in rooting out and recovering waste, fraud and abuse.
Most of the fraud in the system is perpetrated by bad actors on the provider side rather than on the client side. This tracks with national trends. Nationally, the rate of fraud in the FoodShare program is about 1.6%.
The goal of Wisconsin Works (W2, or TANF) is to connect people to family supporting jobs, yet the statutory income eligibility is 115% of the federal poverty line, which is an annual income of $23,104 for a family of three. That means that if a family of three had a single, full-time breadwinner making more than $11.55 they would no longer qualify for the program because a member would have a family supporting job.
The average state approval rates in the FoodShare program has been declining for the last few years and are tracking below national averages. Similarly, the rates of recertification approvals are curiously low when judged against national averages. Based on my previous work on the program nationally, this may be a symptom an administrative issue. I would be very curious to learn more about this.

What do you think? Watch the proceedings here on Wisconsin Eye.

Public Benefits Reform Informational Hearing

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

Based on the testimony and the questioning from the committee members, a couple of things jumped out at me as particularly interesting:

These state agencies are working hard to provide cost-effective services by rooting out internal inefficiencies. They are also invested in rooting out and recovering waste, fraud and abuse.
Most of the fraud in the system is perpetrated by bad actors on the provider side rather than on the client side. This tracks with national trends. Nationally, the rate of fraud in the FoodShare program is about 1.6%.
The goal of Wisconsin Works (W2, or TANF) is to connect people to family supporting jobs, yet the statutory income eligibility is 115% of the federal poverty line, which is an annual income of $23,104 for a family of three. That means that if a family of three had a single, full-time breadwinner making more than $11.55 they would no longer qualify for the program because a member would have a family supporting job.
The average state approval rates in the FoodShare program has been declining for the last few years and are tracking below national averages. Similarly, the rates of recertification approvals are curiously low when judged against national averages. Based on my previous work on the program nationally, this may be a symptom an administrative issue. I would be very curious to learn more about this.

What do you think? Watch the proceedings here on Wisconsin Eye.

Public Benefits Reform Informational Hearing

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

Based on the testimony and the questioning from the committee members, a couple of things jumped out at me as particularly interesting:

These state agencies are working hard to provide cost-effective services by rooting out internal inefficiencies. They are also invested in rooting out and recovering waste, fraud and abuse.
Most of the fraud in the system is perpetrated by bad actors on the provider side rather than on the client side. This tracks with national trends. Nationally, the rate of fraud in the FoodShare program is about 1.6%.
The goal of Wisconsin Works (W2, or TANF) is to connect people to family supporting jobs, yet the statutory income eligibility is 115% of the federal poverty line, which is an annual income of $23,104 for a family of three. That means that if a family of three had a single, full-time breadwinner making more than $11.55 they would no longer qualify for the program because a member would have a family supporting job.
The average state approval rates in the FoodShare program has been declining for the last few years and are tracking below national averages. Similarly, the rates of recertification approvals are curiously low when judged against national averages. Based on my previous work on the program nationally, this may be a symptom an administrative issue. I would be very curious to learn more about this.

What do you think? Watch the proceedings here on Wisconsin Eye.

Public Benefits Reform Informational Hearing

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

Based on the testimony and the questioning from the committee members, a couple of things jumped out at me as particularly interesting:

These state agencies are working hard to provide cost-effective services by rooting out internal inefficiencies. They are also invested in rooting out and recovering waste, fraud and abuse.
Most of the fraud in the system is perpetrated by bad actors on the provider side rather than on the client side. This tracks with national trends. Nationally, the rate of fraud in the FoodShare program is about 1.6%.
The goal of Wisconsin Works (W2, or TANF) is to connect people to family supporting jobs, yet the statutory income eligibility is 115% of the federal poverty line, which is an annual income of $23,104 for a family of three. That means that if a family of three had a single, full-time breadwinner making more than $11.55 they would no longer qualify for the program because a member would have a family supporting job.
The average state approval rates in the FoodShare program has been declining for the last few years and are tracking below national averages. Similarly, the rates of recertification approvals are curiously low when judged against national averages. Based on my previous work on the program nationally, this may be a symptom an administrative issue. I would be very curious to learn more about this.

What do you think? Watch the proceedings here on Wisconsin Eye.

Public Benefits Reform Informational Hearing

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

Based on the testimony and the questioning from the committee members, a couple of things jumped out at me as particularly interesting:

These state agencies are working hard to provide cost-effective services by rooting out internal inefficiencies. They are also invested in rooting out and recovering waste, fraud and abuse.
Most of the fraud in the system is perpetrated by bad actors on the provider side rather than on the client side. This tracks with national trends. Nationally, the rate of fraud in the FoodShare program is about 1.6%.
The goal of Wisconsin Works (W2, or TANF) is to connect people to family supporting jobs, yet the statutory income eligibility is 115% of the federal poverty line, which is an annual income of $23,104 for a family of three. That means that if a family of three had a single, full-time breadwinner making more than $11.55 they would no longer qualify for the program because a member would have a family supporting job.
The average state approval rates in the FoodShare program has been declining for the last few years and are tracking below national averages. Similarly, the rates of recertification approvals are curiously low when judged against national averages. Based on my previous work on the program nationally, this may be a symptom an administrative issue. I would be very curious to learn more about this.

What do you think? Watch the proceedings here on Wisconsin Eye.

Public Benefits Reform Informational Hearing

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

Based on the testimony and the questioning from the committee members, a couple of things jumped out at me as particularly interesting:

These state agencies are working hard to provide cost-effective services by rooting out internal inefficiencies. They are also invested in rooting out and recovering waste, fraud and abuse.
Most of the fraud in the system is perpetrated by bad actors on the provider side rather than on the client side. This tracks with national trends. Nationally, the rate of fraud in the FoodShare program is about 1.6%.
The goal of Wisconsin Works (W2, or TANF) is to connect people to family supporting jobs, yet the statutory income eligibility is 115% of the federal poverty line, which is an annual income of $23,104 for a family of three. That means that if a family of three had a single, full-time breadwinner making more than $11.55 they would no longer qualify for the program because a member would have a family supporting job.
The average state approval rates in the FoodShare program has been declining for the last few years and are tracking below national averages. Similarly, the rates of recertification approvals are curiously low when judged against national averages. Based on my previous work on the program nationally, this may be a symptom an administrative issue. I would be very curious to learn more about this.

What do you think? Watch the proceedings here on Wisconsin Eye.

Public Benefits Reform Informational Hearing

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

Based on the testimony and the questioning from the committee members, a couple of things jumped out at me as particularly interesting:

These state agencies are working hard to provide cost-effective services by rooting out internal inefficiencies. They are also invested in rooting out and recovering waste, fraud and abuse.
Most of the fraud in the system is perpetrated by bad actors on the provider side rather than on the client side. This tracks with national trends. Nationally, the rate of fraud in the FoodShare program is about 1.6%.
The goal of Wisconsin Works (W2, or TANF) is to connect people to family supporting jobs, yet the statutory income eligibility is 115% of the federal poverty line, which is an annual income of $23,104 for a family of three. That means that if a family of three had a single, full-time breadwinner making more than $11.55 they would no longer qualify for the program because a member would have a family supporting job.
The average state approval rates in the FoodShare program has been declining for the last few years and are tracking below national averages. Similarly, the rates of recertification approvals are curiously low when judged against national averages. Based on my previous work on the program nationally, this may be a symptom an administrative issue. I would be very curious to learn more about this.

What do you think? Watch the proceedings here on Wisconsin Eye.

Public Benefits Reform Informational Hearing

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

Based on the testimony and the questioning from the committee members, a couple of things jumped out at me as particularly interesting:

These state agencies are working hard to provide cost-effective services by rooting out internal inefficiencies. They are also invested in rooting out and recovering waste, fraud and abuse.
Most of the fraud in the system is perpetrated by bad actors on the provider side rather than on the client side. This tracks with national trends. Nationally, the rate of fraud in the FoodShare program is about 1.6%.
The goal of Wisconsin Works (W2, or TANF) is to connect people to family supporting jobs, yet the statutory income eligibility is 115% of the federal poverty line, which is an annual income of $23,104 for a family of three. That means that if a family of three had a single, full-time breadwinner making more than $11.55 they would no longer qualify for the program because a member would have a family supporting job.
The average state approval rates in the FoodShare program has been declining for the last few years and are tracking below national averages. Similarly, the rates of recertification approvals are curiously low when judged against national averages. Based on my previous work on the program nationally, this may be a symptom an administrative issue. I would be very curious to learn more about this.

What do you think? Watch the proceedings here on Wisconsin Eye.

Public Benefits Reform Informational Hearing

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

Based on the testimony and the questioning from the committee members, a couple of things jumped out at me as particularly interesting:

These state agencies are working hard to provide cost-effective services by rooting out internal inefficiencies. They are also invested in rooting out and recovering waste, fraud and abuse.
Most of the fraud in the system is perpetrated by bad actors on the provider side rather than on the client side. This tracks with national trends. Nationally, the rate of fraud in the FoodShare program is about 1.6%.
The goal of Wisconsin Works (W2, or TANF) is to connect people to family supporting jobs, yet the statutory income eligibility is 115% of the federal poverty line, which is an annual income of $23,104 for a family of three. That means that if a family of three had a single, full-time breadwinner making more than $11.55 they would no longer qualify for the program because a member would have a family supporting job.
The average state approval rates in the FoodShare program has been declining for the last few years and are tracking below national averages. Similarly, the rates of recertification approvals are curiously low when judged against national averages. Based on my previous work on the program nationally, this may be a symptom an administrative issue. I would be very curious to learn more about this.

What do you think? Watch the proceedings here on Wisconsin Eye.

Public Benefits Reform Informational Hearing

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 2, 2015 Tagged:

Based on the testimony and the questioning from the committee members, a couple of things jumped out at me as particularly interesting:

These state agencies are working hard to provide cost-effective services by rooting out internal inefficiencies. They are also invested in rooting out and recovering waste, fraud and abuse.
Most of the fraud in the system is perpetrated by bad actors on the provider side rather than on the client side. This tracks with national trends. Nationally, the rate of fraud in the FoodShare program is about 1.6%.
The goal of Wisconsin Works (W2, or TANF) is to connect people to family supporting jobs, yet the statutory income eligibility is 115% of the federal poverty line, which is an annual income of $23,104 for a family of three. That means that if a family of three had a single, full-time breadwinner making more than $11.55 they would no longer qualify for the program because a member would have a family supporting job.
The average state approval rates in the FoodShare program has been declining for the last few years and are tracking below national averages. Similarly, the rates of recertification approvals are curiously low when judged against national averages. Based on my previous work on the program nationally, this may be a symptom an administrative issue. I would be very curious to learn more about this.

What do you think? Watch the proceedings here on Wisconsin Eye.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged: Member News

When I first joined the Feeding America National Office as their director of government relations and advocacy in 2010, my very first state legislative issue was Wisconsin's tax-check off. It was a warm welcome to my new role since I was a Wisconsinite commuting on the Amtrak down to Chicago every day.

The issue was that while our member food banks had gotten a piece of legislation passed to be one of the ten lucky charities in Wisconsin to be included on our state tax form, the statute had it written that the donations would go to the "Second Harvest Food Banks" in the state.

This was just a few years after the rebranding of America's Second Harvest to Feeding America and the name change of Second Harvest of Wisconsin to Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin. And it caused the Department of Revenue some consternation.

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

A couple of conference calls and letters to the department of revenue, along with Feeding America's contract ironed the whole situation out. It's funny to me now five years later, I have my position here. Maybe I made a good first impression?

Anyway, as tax time approaches this year, you can make my work five years ago really impactful by donating a portion of your state tax refund to my members. The tax check off makes it easy for you to support our work.

If you use tax preparation software like TurboTax, an option to donate to local charities will come up toward the end of your state return. Simply select "hunger relief" or "Feeding America" and voila, you're done. TurboTax will even remember your donation for next year for your deductions!

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Funds will be distributed between our members in Wisconsin by the percentage of the state that each one of them serves. Your generous support makes it possible for our members to do their work and for every dollar that you donate, our food banks can provide at least 5 meals to the families that visit our food programs.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged: Eastern Wisconsin

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged: OrangeIsTheNewCNR

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.

Turn Tax Time into Dinner Time

Posted by David Lee in on Feb 1, 2015 Tagged:

Wisconsin residents are very generous and so there was a significant amount of donations being held up by the state because they couldn't disburse them to the now Feeding America food banks.

If you are filling out the Wisconsin state tax return forms, you can find the option to donate on line 26 of the short form or line 25 on the long form.