With a mission of “Fighting Hunger in Central Florida” you would think Second Harvest would resort to more boxing analogies. Well, Monday, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service released its annual study measuring food security in the United States and it looks like we continue to have our work cut out for us.

Here are some key findings:

• In 2009, 50.2 million (16.6%) Americans lived in food insecure households. 
• In 2009, 17.2 million (23.2%) children were living in food insecure households. 
• In 2009, 2.2 million (7.5%) households with seniors were living in food insecure households.
• In 2009, 884,000 (7.8%) seniors living alone were living in food insecure households.

The full report can be viewed at: http://www.ers.usda.gov/Publications/ERR108/ERR108.pdf

To bring this national story back to the local level, the Orlando Sentinel profiled Central Florida’s response to food insecurity and hunger.

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/orange/os-central-florida-hunger-20101115,0,420934.story

Much like Little Mac in PunchOut, our opponent seems to be insurmountable, but the one thing we have in our corner is the community. Second Harvest continues to be able to fight hunger with our partner feeding agencies, volunteers, and donors.

 As a team we’ll continue to keep fighting until hunger is down for the count.

Brady Koch
Director of Agency Relations & Programs 

If you answer yes to this question, you likely have had a lesson on the anatomy of MyPyramid. At a glance, MyPyramid is not self-explanatory. It symbolizes an approach to healthy eating and physical activity, but does not necessarily explain it.

Well .. hooray! A redesign of the pyramid is underway and will follow the release of the new Dietary Guidelines this December.

Feel free to read more: Rethinking The Food Pyramid: USDA Aims For ‘Superior’ Guide

Until then, if you are interested in attending or hosting the free class, What’s a Healthy Diet?, contact me at mali@foodbankcentralflorida.org. This class explains what a healthy diet consists of and provides a breakdown of the food guide pyramid.

Maria Ali, RD, LD/N
Nutrition Manager

This summer, we’ve provided Central Florida kids with over 42,000 meals at a variety of community programs through the Summer Food Service Program. Additionally we reach thousands of children through our Benefits Connection food stamp outreach program.

The USDA is considering a pilot program that will merge both programs into a benefit hybrid that is designed to provide children with food during the Summer when they don’t have access to the Free and Reduced Meal Program.

News Article: 16 Million Hungry Kids, 1 New Idea for Feeding Them

 What do you think of the idea? It could potentially reach many more children, but what about the accountability of the EBT cards? Hopefully Florida will participate in the pilot and we can provide even more meals to kids next summer.

Brady Koch
Director of Agency Relations & Programs

Our Benefits Connection food stamp outreach program is making a positive difference for those in our community every day. The average monthly benefit from one of our food stamp applications is $223. Receiving food stamp assistance is the boost many families need while bouncing back from unemployment and other life-changing events.

Through the success of our program, we’ve found ourselves in the national spotlight. Last week the newly appointed Deputy Administrator for Food and Nutrition Service visited Second Harvest with other VIP officials from the USDA in addition to the food stamp team from local Department of Children and Families. They were thrilled with the stats we shared tracking the growth and impact of our food stamp program.

We love being able to share the success of our programs with all types of audiences.

Why don’t you come down to a Food for Thought and learn about all of the ways that we’re fighting hunger in Central Florida? We’ll give you the VIP tour.

Left to Right: Janet Foggs, Don Arnett, Sharron Washington, Lisa Pino, Dave Krepcho, Sandrene Stevens, Peggy Fouts, Nitza Colon, Yours Truly, Tom Sallette

Janet Foggs is a Government Operations Consultant, Don Arnett is the Regional Director for USDA Southeast, Sharron Washington is Circuit 9 ACCESS Operations Manager, Lisa Pino is USDA Deputy Administrator of Food and Nutrition Service, Sandrene Stevens is DCF Program Administrator for Orange County, Peggy Fouts is the Director for the Food and Nutrition Assistance Program for USDA Southeast Region and Tom Salette is Program Specialist for DCF.

Brady Koch
Director of Agency Relations & Programs

One of the programs I oversee here at Second Harvest is our Benefits Connection Program. This team of food bankers goes out into the community with laptops and scanners to complete food stamp applications at our partner feeding programs.

Since this program started a year ago it has generated over $6 million in food stamp dollars. We love this program, because the clients get to pick exactly what food they need for their family with these dollars.

I’m in the middle of researching some national statistics about food stamp use and found a wealth of information from the USDA.

Those who know me, know that I love numbers! I thought you might be interested in some of the facts about food stamp participants nationally:

• 49% are children
• 9% are over 60 years old
• 41% of all participants lived in households with earnings
• 13% have incomes over the poverty line
• 15% have no cash income of any kind
• $691 is the average gross income
• Average food stamp household received monthly benefit of $212.
• Only 7% of applicants get the minimum amount of $10.
• Average household size is 2.2
• 44% are Caucasian
• 33% are African-American
• 19% are Hispanic
• 4% are of other races

If you’re interested in Benefits Connection, or any of our other food outreach programs, please contact me.

Brady Koch
Director of Agency Relations & Programs
407.295.1066 ext. 30
bkoch@foodbankcentralflorida.org