[Senate Hearing 110-29]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 110-29
THE ROLE OF FEDERAL FOOD
ASSISTANCE PROGRAMS IN FAMILY
ECONOMIC SECURITY AND NUTRITION
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE,
NUTRITION, AND FORESTRY
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
JANUARY 31, 2007
__________
Printed for the use of the
Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.agriculture.senate.gov
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COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE, NUTRITION, AND FORESTRY
TOM HARKIN, Iowa, Chairman
PATRICK J. LEAHY, Vermont SAXBY CHAMBLISS, Georgia
KENT CONRAD, North Dakota RICHARD G. LUGAR, Indiana
MAX BAUCUS, Montana THAD COCHRAN, Mississippi
BLANCHE L. LINCOLN, Arkansas MITCH McCONNELL, Kentucky
DEBBIE A. STABENOW, Michigan PAT ROBERTS, Kansas
E. BENJAMIN NELSON, Nebraska LINDSEY GRAHAM, South Carolina
KEN SALAZAR, Colorado NORM COLEMAN, Minnesota
SHERROD BROWN, Ohio MICHEAL D. CRAPO, Idaho
ROBERT P. CASEY, Jr., Pennsylvania JOHN THUNE, South Dakota
AMY KLOBUCHAR, Minnesota CHARLES E. GRASSLEY, Iowa
Mark Halverson, Majority Staff Director
Robert E. Sturm, Chief Clerk
Martha Scott Poindexter, Minority Staff Director
Vernie Hubert, Minority General Counsel
(ii)
C O N T E N T S
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Page
Hearing(s):
The Role of Federal Food Assistance Programs in Family Economic
Security and Nutrition......................................... 1
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Wednesday, January 31, 2007
STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY SENATORS
Harkin, Hon. Tom, a U.S. Senator from Iowa, Chairman, Committee
on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry......................... 1
Chambliss, Hon. Saxby, a U.S. Senator from Georgia............... 2
Panel I
Dostis, Robert, Executive Director, Vermont Campaign to end
Childhood Hunger............................................... 8
Greenstein, Robert, Executive Director, Center on Budget and
Policy Priorities.............................................. 7
Nilsen, Sigurd, Director, Education, Workforce, and Income
Security Issues, Government Accountability Office.............. 5
Stewart, Rhonda, Hamilton, Ohio.................................. 10
Panel II
Bolling, Bill, Executive Director, Atlanta Community Food Bank,
Atlanta, Georgia............................................... 25
Francis, Luanne, Program Manager, Health Care for all, Kingsley
House, New Orleans, Louisiana.................................. 27
Kubik, Frank, Manager, Commodity Supplemental Food Program,
Focus: Hope, Detroit, Michigan................................. 31
Newport, Melinda, Director, Nutrition Services, Chickasaw Nation,
Ada, Oklahoma.................................................. 29
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APPENDIX
Prepared Statements:
Casey, Hon. Robert P., Jr.................................... 44
Leahy, Hon. Patrick J........................................ 45
Nelson, Hon. E. Benjamin..................................... 46
Roberts, Hon. Pat............................................ 47
Salazar, Hon. Ken............................................ 49
Thune, Hon. John............................................. 51
Bolling, Bill................................................ 53
Dostis, Robert............................................... 59
Francis, Luanne.............................................. 67
Greenstein, Robert........................................... 70
Kubik, Frank................................................. 88
Newport, Melinda............................................. 93
Nilsen, Sigurd............................................... 101
Stewart, Rhonda.............................................. 128
Document(s) Submitted for the Record:
American Dietetic Association.................................... 136
American Public Human Services Association, prepared statement... 139
Bread for the World, prepared statement.......................... 152
Catholic Charities USA, prepared statement....................... 159
Food Research & Action Center, prepared statement................ 164
National Commodity Supplemental Food Program Association,
prepared statement............................................. 191
New America Foundation, prepared statement....................... 195
Society for Nutrition Education, prepared statement.............. 201
Question(s) and Answer(s):
Casey, Hon. Robert P., Jr.:
Written questions for Mr. Nilsen............................. 210
Written questions for Mr. Dostis............................. 211
Written questions for Mr. Kubik.............................. 212
Written questions for Mr. Greenstein......................... 213
Coleman, Hon. Norm:
Written questions for Mr. Dostis............................. 214
Dostis, Robert:
Written response to questions from Hon. Robert P. Casey, Jr.. 217
Written response to questions from Hon. Norm Coleman......... 219
THE ROLE OF FEDERAL FOOD
ASSISTANCE PROGRAMS IN FAMILY
ECONOMIC SECURITY AND NUTRITION
----------
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
U.S. Senate,
Committee on Agriculture,
Nutrition, and Forestry,
Washington, DC
The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m., in room
SR-328A, Russell Senate Office Building, Hon. Tom Harkin
(Chairman of the Committee) presiding.
Present: Senators Harkin, Lincoln, Nelson, Salazar, Brown,
Casey, Chambliss, Cochran, McConnell, Thune, and Grassley.
STATEMENT OF HON. TOM HARKIN, A U.S. SENATOR FROM IOWA,
CHAIRMAN, COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE, NUTRITION AND FORESTRY
Chairman Harkin. The Senate Committee on Agriculture,
Nutrition and Forestry will come to order.
Our hearing today is on nutrition. We begin gathering
information and data for the upcoming writing of the farm bill.
In recent decades, our country has made remarkable progress
in addressing hunger and malnutrition, but the problem is that
we still see some gaps. Food assistance often operates under
the radar screen. Like the working families they serve, the
nutrition programs operate out of sight and out of mind.
However, some things bring to light the importance of these
programs. We must mention Hurricane Katrina when food
assistance brought relief, critical relief, to millions of
Americans. As a result of the Gulf hurricanes of 2005, 1.8
million households turned to the Food Stamp Program to meet
their household needs.
Every day, Federal nutrition programs support Americans who
live on the margins of our economy, persons with disabilities,
children, the elderly, working families not making enough to
get by. Fifty percent of food stamp recipients are children; 89
percent of food stamp households contain an elderly person, a
person with a disability, or a child.
There are twice as many food stamp households with earnings
than there are households that receive just the TANF benefits.
In the early nineties, we shifted to Electronic Benefit
Transfer (EBT) cards because of all the trafficking and benefit
trading in the Food Stamp Program. Since then, the rate of
trafficking has been cut from 4 cents of every dollar of
benefits in 1990 to just one cent per dollar today.
Rates of erroneous payments were high in the 1990's, almost
11 percent. We brought that down to a record low of under 6
percent in 2005. Clearly, additional things can be done, and
that is why we seek some information on how we can even make it
better.
One last thing I would just mention for the record, and
that is the committee must also grapple with the apparent
paradox of food insecurity and obesity. How is it that many of
the same families who struggle to get by also seem at greatest
risk of becoming overweight and developing diet-related chronic
diseases like diabetes?
This hearing is an important reminder of just how broad the
jurisdiction of our committee is. It is the Agriculture,
Nutrition and Forestry Committee, and we intend to fulfill our
obligations to make sure that we meet the nutritional needs of
our country.
With that, I will turn to my colleague, Senator Saxby
Chambliss.
STATEMENT OF HON. SAXBY CHAMBLISS, A U.S. SENATOR FROM GEORGIA
Senator Chambliss. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding
this hearing today.
Nutrition is an important and often overlooked component of
the farm bill and I appreciate the bipartisan approach we have
taken on nutrition issues in the past, and I hope that we will
continue to work together as we put together this year's farm
bill.
I also want to say that I am pleased that my good friend
Bill Bolling will testify today on behalf of the Atlanta
Community Food Bank and America's Second Harvest. Bill is the
Executive Director of the Atlanta Community Food Bank. Bill is
a good friend and I recently visited his facility, which is an
amazing operation, Mr. Chairman.
You and I have agreed that we are going to do a nutrition
hearing in Atlanta. He has a great facility at which we can do
it, and it will give you a chance to see an unbelievable
operation that provides nutritional food to literally thousands
of households in a way that is truly unbelievable.
Our nutrition assistance programs play a key role in
ensuring that needy Americans have access to the food they need
to lead healthy, productive lives. I know from the teachers in
my family the importance of nutrition, especially for our
children's development.
Moreover, the food for nutrition programs comes from U.S.
farmers, which helps agriculture.
Finally, food assistance programs are an important part of
this country's safety net. Not long ago, the Nation witnessed
the Food Stamp Program's effective emergency response to
evacuees from Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. The U.S. Food
Assistance Programs are good for families, good for farmers,
and good for America.
The Food Stamp Program not only helps by providing food and
emergency aid, it helps America's needy families on the path to
independence and self-sufficiency.
The goals of the 1996 Welfare Reform were spelled out in
the title, to increase personal responsibility and work
opportunity. In essence, Congress asked our Nation's families
on welfare to take personal responsibility for themselves and
join the workforce. And many of those families did.
In the 10 years since Welfare Reform was passed by Congress
and signed by President Clinton, fewer families receive cash
welfare and more families are working. According to the
Congressional Research Service from 1996 to 2005 the number of
food stamp households with children who received cash welfare
payments decreased by 57 percent, and the number who reported
earned income increased by 41 percent.
Many families have transitioned from welfare to work and
the Food Stamp Program should do more to encourage this
continuing transition.
States have done a great job of addressing food stamps
error rates. From fiscal year 2000 to fiscal year 2005, while
average monthly participation increased to a near historical
high of almost 26 million people, the combined error rates of
overpayments and underpayments fell by 34 percent, to a
historical low of 5.84 percent.
Mr. Chairman, in the 2002 farm bill, Congress legislated
many options states can choose from to make the administration
of the Food Stamp Program easier. Most States have taken
advantage of at least some of these options and the program
serves both taxpayers and recipients better today than it ever
has.
However, we do have room to improve. Although I realize we
may not be able to achieve every suggested improvement due to
budget constraints, there are a few ideas worthy of
consideration.
First, we should take a look at extending the special
allowance for privatized managed housing provided for our
Nation's military families. Senator Roberts introduced a bill
on this issue in the 109th Congress, and we should explore what
can be done administratively without the need for legislation.
Next, while many former welfare families are now working,
there are some aspects of the Food Stamp Program that may
reduce working families' ability to escape the cycle of
poverty. The law encourages welfare families to enter the
workforce and begin to save money.
However, food stamp asset rules conflict with families'
ability to save for their future. The asset limit of $2,000 for
most food stamp recipients was set more than 20 years ago. When
indexed for inflation, the asset limit would be almost $4,000
today. A higher asset limit may help families buildup savings
in order to achieve financial independence and prepare for a
rainy day or give an education, and eventually end their need
to receive food stamps.
Finally, food stamp rules discourage working families from
utilizing all of the financial investment tools encouraged by
the tax code for other working Americans. We should take a look
at permitting investment in modern savings programs, for
retirement and for higher education.
Mr. Chairman, as I mentioned before, I understand we will
likely be facing budgetary pressures in crafting the farm bill.
However, I hope we can work together to address these issues,
especially the asset limits, reforming food stamp asset limits
has the potential to help needy families break the cycle of
poverty and achieve long-term financial independence.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I look forward to our witnesses'
testimony.
Chairman Harkin. Thank you, Senator Chambliss.
We have nine members. We need a quorum. We need to report
out our committee rules and our funding resolution that Senator
Chambliss' staff and our staff have worked out. But I cannot do
it, we need a quorum.
So we will go ahead with the hearing. As soon as we get--we
need two more, 11. If we get a quorum, I will interrupt the
hearing. We will pass those out. But I know Senators have busy
schedules, other hearings and things like that. So I really
appreciate your being here at this point.
We also have two votes at 11:30, so we are going to have to
proceed efficiently, so I am going to ask people to limit their
questions. I am going to ask our witnesses to limit their
testimony to five minutes and we will also hold to these
restraints.
I will introduce our first panel. Sigurd Nilsen is the
Director of Education, Workforce, and Income Security at the
Government Accountability Office. I want to thank you and the
GAO for all of the great work you have done on this program.
You have identified both the strengths and weaknesses of our
nations nutrition programs.
Bob Greenstein, Executive Director at the Center on Budget
and Policy Priorities. I think all of us here have known Bob
for many years. I first met Bob when I got on the Ag Committee
in 1975. He was working on these issues then, and of course,
was the Administrator of the Food and Nutrition Service during
the Carter Administration. He is a renowned expert on all areas
dealing with food and food assistance programs.
Robert Dostis is the Executive Director of the Vermont
Campaign to End Childhood Hunger.
I am especially pleased to be able to introduce Ms. Rhonda
Stewart, who comes to us from Hamilton, Ohio. Ms. Stewart works
with the Outreach for Community, a non profit organization
helping lower income residents in Hamilton, Ohio.
She is also a food stamp recipient, and she is here with
her 9-year-old son, Wyatt who, before many of you got here,
actually chaired this committee for a while, and did it in fine
fashion.
I also want to say that, again, accompanying Robert Dostis
is Jim Weill with the Food Research and Action Center.
With that----
Senator Brown. Mr. Chairman, if I could introduce Ms.
Stewart. You have done very well.
Chairman Harkin. Go ahead. I will recognize Senator Brown
right now.
Senator Brown. Thank you.
I just want to recognize Ms. Stewart. Thank you very much
for coming, and Wyatt, thank you again for being here and
accompanying your mother on this trip to Washington, DC
Ms. Stewart does everything right that we ask her to. She
works, she is the president of the PTA, she teaches Sunday
school class, she is involved in Cub Scouts. Yet in this
society where wages too often are so low, too often she runs
out of food stamps and money by the end of the week.
Martin Luther King once said that equality means getting a
paycheck that last through the week. With minimum wage coming
up this week, with Ms. Stewart telling her story which is
compelling, I suggest all my colleagues read her statement and
listen to her, I think you will learn something.
So thank you for coming. And Wyatt, thank you very much.
Wyatt is also a committee photographer.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Harkin. Thank you, Senator Brown.
Mr. Nilsen, welcome to the committee. All of your written
statements will be made a part of the record in their entirety,
without objection.
Mr. Nilsen, if you could go ahead and just give us an
overview of your written testimony, I would appreciate it. You
are recognized for 5 minutes.
STATEMENT OF SIGURD NILSEN, DIRECTOR, EDUCATION, WORKFORCE, AND
INCOME SECURITY ISSUES, GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABILITY OFFICE
Mr. Nilsen. Thank you.
Chairman Harkin and members of the committee. I am pleased
to be here today to discuss findings from our work related to
the integrity of the Food Stamp Program.
First, improper payments; and second, trafficking of food
stamp benefits. As this chart over here illustrates, the
national payment error rate has declined by about 40 percent
between 1999 and 2005, from roughly 10 percent, as the Chairman
noted, to a record low of just under 6 percent. In 2005,
payment errors totaled about $1.7 billion. However, if the
error rate had not declined and the 1999 error rate was still
the norm, program payment errors would have been over $1.1
billion higher.
I would like to highlight what the chart also illustrates,
and that is that the total error rate is the sum of the two
lower lines. The upper line----
Chairman Harkin. We cannot see it. Do you have anybody over
there to hold it up? I cannot see that.
Mr. Nilsen. The upper line is the overpayments and the
lower line are underpayments. Typically overpayments are about
three-quarters of the total error rate.
The reduction in State payment error rates has been
widespread with error rates falling in 41 States and the
District of Columbia, and 18 States reduced their error rates
by one-third or more. For example, Illinois' error rate dropped
by two-thirds, from nearly 15 percent in 1999 to under 5
percent in 2003.
Payment errors have many causes, but two-thirds of errors
are due to caseworkers making mistakes when applying complex
program rules or failing to act on new information. The other
one-third of errors are due to participants failing to report
needed information or providing incomplete or incorrect
information. However, it is important to note that just 5
percent of payment errors were due to participant fraud in
2003.
FNS has long focused its attention on States'
accountability for errors rates through its Quality Control, or
QC, system by assessing penalties and providing financial
incentives. For their part, States have adopted a combination
of practices to address payment accuracy problems. For example,
California officials reported expanding State oversight, hiring
a contractor to perform assessments and provide training,
preparing detailed error analyses, and implementing a quality
assurance case review system in Los Angeles County, which
accounted for 40 percent of the State's caseload. California
State officials credit this multifaceted approach for the
State's dramatic error rate reduction from over 17 percent in
2001 to 6.4 percent in 2005.
In addition, 47 States have adopted some form of simplified
reporting that allows food stamp recipients to update their
financial data less frequently. This has been shown to have
contributed to the reduction in the payment error rate by
simplifying the process for both caseworkers and participants.
Now I would like to talk about the progress that has been
made in reducing the trafficking of food stamps, that is,
exchanging food stamp benefits for cash, where participants
usually receive 50 cents on the dollar for their food stamp
benefits.
As this table illustrates, since the 1990's the rate of
food stamp trafficking declined by three-quarters, from about
3.8 cents per dollar, as the Chairman noted, in the 1990's to
about 1 cent today, reducing the amount trafficked from over
$800 million a year to about $240 million a year today.
Trafficking is more likely to occur in smaller stores, however.
Even though they redeem less than 14 percent of food stamp
benefits, they have a trafficking rate of about 7.6 cents per
dollar. In contrast, large stores, which redeem the lion's
share of benefits, have a trafficking rate of only 0.2 cents
per dollar.
FNS has taken advantage of electronic benefit transfer, or
EBT, cards and other new technology to improve its ability to
detect trafficking and disqualify retailers who traffic.
However, law enforcement agencies have investigated and
referred for prosecution a decreasing number of traffickers.
Instead, they focus on fewer high-impact investigations.
Despite the progress FNS has made in combating retailer
trafficking, the Food Stamp Program remains vulnerable because
retailers can enter the program intending to traffic, do so,
often without fear of severe criminal penalties, as the
declining number of investigations suggests.
In conclusion, both payment errors and trafficking of
benefits have declined at a time of rising participation in the
program. While program complexity is a fundamental contributor
to errors, ensuring program integrity remains a fundamental
challenge facing the Food Stamp Program. In particular, FNS
needs to develop a more focused effort to target and disqualify
stores that traffic, thus helping FNS meet its continuing
challenge of ensuring that stores are available in areas of
high need, while still maintaining program integrity.
Mr. Chairman, this concludes my prepared statement, and I
would be happy to answer any questions you or members of the
Committee have at this time.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Nilsen can be found on page
101 in the appendix.]
Chairman Harkin. Thank you.
I am informed that our clock is not working. That was less
than 5 minutes? OK. Great example.
Mr. Greenstein, welcome back to this Committee. You are no
stranger here. Again, your testimony will be made part of the
record in its entirety. Please proceed.
STATEMENT OF ROBERT GREENSTEIN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, CENTER ON
BUDGET AND POLICY PRIORITIES
Mr. Greenstein. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am Bob
Greenstein, Director of the Center on Budget and Policy
Priorities. As administrator of the Food and Nutrition Service
in the late 1970's, I was fortunate to work with Congress on
the Food Stamp Act of 1977, which grew out of bipartisan
legislation designed by Senators Dole and McGovern, and
something on which you, Mr. Chairman, Senator Cochran, and
other members of this Committee were very actively involved.
This year marks the 30th anniversary of that historic
legislation, and you will be reauthorizing that as part of the
farm bill. Experts regard the Food Stamp Program as the single
most important anti-hunger program in our Nation.
Back in the 1960's, hunger and malnutrition were pretty
severe problems in a number of very poor parts of this country.
The problems are much less severe today, and research has shown
that the Food Stamp Program is a primary, probably the primary
reason for the difference. In the 1980's, Senator Dole
described the Food Stamp Program as ``the most important
advance in the Nation's social programs since the creation of
Social Security.''
Today, the program continues to be one of the Government's
soundest investments. By taking advantage of modern technology
and business practices, the program in recent years has become
substantially more efficient, more accurate, and more
effective. Earlier this month, National Journal rated it as one
of the Government's leading successes, calling it ``a case
study in effective government aid,'' and citing, among other
things, the big reduction in error and fraud rates that Mr.
Nilsen just talked about.
Food stamps also lessen the severity of poverty. Census
data show that in 2004, the latest year for which these data
are available, food stamps lifted 2.2 million Americans above
the poverty line, half of them children, and lifted more
children out of extreme poverty than any other Federal program.
They also helped families bridge temporary periods of
unemployment. Studies have found that half of all entrants to
the Food Stamp Program participate for 8 months or less, and
then leave as the need goes away. Food stamps also support
work. Twice as many food stamp households today work as rely
solely on public assistance benefits. But there are some larger
issues in this society we need to look at that have
implications for the food stamp reauthorization. Three key
points are worth noting.
First, poverty remains high. In 2005, the most recent year
for which these data are available from Census, 37 million
Americans were poor, a 17-percent increase over 2000.
Second, the census data also show that the incomes of low-
wage working families have been stagnant in recent years, while
families' expenses have continued to rise. Roughly 60 percent
of poor households now pay more than half of their income for
housing. Health care and child care costs have been rising
faster than the incomes of low-income families. The result is
that expenses are absorbing an increased share of families'
limited budgets, leaving less for food.
And, third, Census and USDA data show that 35 million
Americans live in households that sometimes have difficulty
affording food, suffering from what is termed ``food
insecurity.''
The Food Stamp Program is our first line of defense against
these problems, but it can do more to address them, and that
will require new investments in three broad areas.
First, despite recent progress, only about 50 percent of
eligible working poor households and fewer than 30 percent of
eligible seniors participate in the program. The Committee
should look for opportunities to streamline and simplify
program rules, both so that more of those who are eligible can
participate and so that administrative costs are held down.
Second, food stamp benefits I believe are too small, and of
particular concern, they are eroding in food purchasing power
each year due to a flaw in the structure of the program's
standard deduction and, to a lesser degree, in its minimum
benefit. A key to reducing hunger is to ensure that food stamp
households have the resources to secure an adequate diet. The
average benefit in the program, now about $1 per person per
meal, is not sufficient for that task.
And, third, but certainly not least, many poor households
that have accumulated modest savings, as well as many
unemployed workers without children who are looking for work
but cannot find it, and many legal immigrants, including legal
immigrant parents working hard for low wages, are excluded from
the program even though they face food insecurity, too.
Addressing these eligibility barriers is, in my view, the
single most important change the Committee can make. And on the
issue of assets, I would like to associate myself strongly with
Senator Chambliss' remarks on those issues at the beginning of
this hearing.
In conclusion, the Food Stamp Program plays a vital role. I
urge the Committee to build upon its strong track record in
addressing hunger and making appropriate investments in the
program so that it will do even better in the years ahead.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Greenstein can be found on
page 70 in the appendix.]
Chairman Harkin. Thank you, Mr. Greenstein.
Next we go to Robert Dostis, Executive Directors of the
Vermont Campaign to End Childhood Hunger. Mr. Dostis?
STATEMENT OF ROBERT DOSTIS, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, VERMONT
CAMPAIGN TO END CHILDHOOD HUNGER
Mr. Dostis. Thank you, Chairman Harkin and Senator
Chambliss and members of the Committee, for this opportunity to
address the Food Stamp Program's fundamental role in serving
our Nation's nutritional health. I commend your past diligence
in maintaining the program's entitlement structure, and I
especially want to thank Vermont's senior Senator Patrick Leahy
for all his support on Federal nutrition programs.
I want to share with you, first, how the Food Stamp
Program, as the single most effective assistance program in the
country, is making a difference in our communities; and,
second, that by strengthening and improving the program, you
can address the disturbing trend of increasing rates of hunger
in America.
I am here as the Executive Director of the Vermont Campaign
to End Childhood Hunger and as one among hundreds of anti-
hunger organizations affiliated with our national counterpart,
the Food Research and Action Center. And, Mr. Chairman, on
their behalf I have a letter I would like to introduce into the
record.
Chairman Harkin. Without objection.
[The following information can be found on page 164 in the
appendix.]
I am here also as a registered dietitian who knows that
hunger and poor diet result in obesity, compromised health, and
chronic disease. The devastating effect of hunger is
indisputable. Nutrient deficiencies in children compromise
their physical, cognitive, and emotional development. In my
role as a State legislator, I see the burden hunger puts on our
State by increasing health care and education costs.
Hunger and food insecurity exist in every corner of the
Nation. My written testimony, which I have submitted, includes
extensive data on the extent of hunger and food insecurity and
studies on health impact of poor nutrition. With rising
housing, transportation, and health care costs, it is
increasingly difficult for families to make ends meet,
especially when wages are not keeping pace with inflation. To
feed families, they borrow, they scrimp, and then they do
without. Food is one of the most flexible items in the
household budget, so they cope by foregoing the more costly but
wholesome foods, like fruits, vegetables, and whole grains, and
instead purchase cheap but filling foods that are high in fat,
sugar, sodium, and calories but low in nutritional value--foods
that contribute to America's health problems.
The Food Stamp Program is a vital resource. It is a program
that works and it works well. It feeds people. It also promotes
good diets, prevents obesity and chronic disease, and provides
families a consistent and reliable and, importantly, a
dignified way of obtaining food, especially during those tough
economic family times. It is America's first line of defense
against hunger.
I want to highlight that this Committee has consistently
protected the program's entitlement structure, making food
stamps immediately available to those hit by economic disaster,
such as the two manufacturing plant closings in Middlebury,
Vermont. And I know Senator Brown has experienced some issues
in his State as well about manufacturing plant closings.
Food stamps help so many people. Some of their stories I
have written in my statement, like the family at risk of being
evicted who gets signed up for food stamps, freeing up enough
money to pay their rent and still eat; the dad working as a
milker on a dairy farm who faced financial crisis when his
premature twins required special medical care; the intern in my
office, as I was preparing this testimony, who confided in me
that she and her mom received food stamps and, when they did,
their diets were healthier and they got along a lot better
because there was less stress.
The Food Stamp Program provides these families and over 26
million other Americans with heightened food security. Despite
the program's success, there is still hunger, and people who
need help are not getting it. There are obstacles to
participation and stories of the underserved. There are gaps,
namely, benefit allotments are not adequate and asset limits
are too low.
I think of the senior I learned of who gets food stamps but
cannot afford the foods required for his medical condition; the
homeless family who is losing food stamp benefits because they
exceeded the program's asset limits as they try to save money
for their first month's rent and security deposit; or the
elementary school principal who shared with me the story of a
young girl who was holding her stomach on a Monday morning
because there was no food in her home, and the last meal she
had eaten was lunch at school on Friday.
I know personally the limitations of the program. Growing
up, my father made too much money for us to qualify for food
stamps, but too little money to cover rent, heat, and food.
Personally, I know the painful nature of the gaps I just spoke
about.
In conclusion, a strengthened food stamp program will have
a far-reaching effect, helping reduce obesity and nutrition-
related illnesses, helping curb rising health care costs,
improving the cognitive development and education of children,
and bolstering local economies and agriculture as families
consume more fruits, vegetables, proteins, and whole grain. A
strengthened Food Stamp Program is a sound investment in our
future and will help steer the course for the health and well-
being of America's children, families, and elderly.
I thank you for your time.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Dostis can be found on page
59 in the appendix.]
Chairman Harkin. Thank you, Mr. Dostis.
And now we turn to Rhonda Stewart from Hamilton, Ohio. Ms.
Stewart?
STATEMENT OF RHONDA STEWART, HAMILTON, OHIO
Ms. Stewart. Chairman Harkin, distinguished ladies and
gentlemen of the Senate, I would like to thank you for this
opportunity to speak with you today. And, Senator Brown, thank
you for introducing me.
I am also a food stamp recipient. The first time I
participated in the program was in 2003. I received food stamp
benefits for about a year and a half, and then in mid-2005, I
started receiving my child support again so my son and I were
able to make it on our own.
Unfortunately, after a year of steady child support
payments, my ex-husband lost his job due to a plant closing at
Sara Lee. The child support, if it came, was not regular, and
my income just did not go far enough to pay for our basic
needs, especially food.
The cheapest food I could afford to buy was not the
healthiest for my son. I can buy a can of Spaghetti-O's for
less than $1, but a gallon of milk is almost $3. A pack of
Kool-Aid costs a dime, but a can of juice is $3.50 to $4. I
contacted the outreach worker, Gloria Bateman, at Shared
Harvest Food Bank and asked her to meet with me to help me fill
out an application for food stamps.
I currently earn $900 a month at my job. My rent is $440. I
pay my utilities, including gas and electric. After paying
rent, utilities, car insurance, and gasoline, there is not much
left to meet the needs of my son.
Before I started to get food stamps, I paid bills every
other month--my phone bill this month, my electric bill next. I
learned how long I could go before I lost my heat. Eventually,
I did lose my phone. I was scraping by to buy what groceries I
could. In the months when I do receive child support, I must
use these funds to pay my utility bill to avoid it getting shut
off.
The child support I receive is never spent on food.
Sometimes I could buy real milk for us. Sometimes it was
powdered milk. I always made sure my son had something to eat.
I say this because on some nights he would ask me if I was
feeling OK because I was not eating. I would just reply,
``Yeah. I'm just not hungry tonight, buddy.''
Once again I am receiving food stamps and have been for the
last 7 months. I decided to apply for food stamps again because
I couldn't do it on my own anymore and we needed help, and I
don't want my son to suffer. Unfortunately, the amount food
stamps I receive varies from month to month due to my sporadic
child support payments. This month, I received $103 in food
stamps. Last month, it was $174. it is so hard to budget when
my food stamps drop so significantly from month to month. I am
very grateful for the months when my son is able to eat the
healthier and more nutritious foods he needs. However, some
days he has dinner. I have a grilled cheese sandwich, or I am
just not hungry.
I am very careful how I spend my food stamp benefits. I
shop at an off-brand store some of you may have heard called
Aldi's for most of my groceries. The first 2 weeks of the month
are OK. The last few get a little weird. My son says, ``Momma
gets creative with dinner.''
In some months when my food stamp benefits are lower, I run
out of food stamps before the end of the month. I am always
watching the calendar for the first of the month to come so I
have access to my benefits and we can eat again. I would love
to have fresh veggies in the refrigerator and fruit on the
counter. Wyatt loves these things. He knows at the beginning of
the month we have a more traditional family dinner, with a
meat, one or two veggies, and some corn muffins--his favorite.
He has also come to learn that toward the end of the month we
seem to have a generic Hamburger Helper with processed ground
turkey because it is cheaper than beef.
At the beginning of the month, he knows it is OK to ask me
to fix his favorite foods again because I have the ability to
get these for him. And by his favorite foods, I mean pork
chops, a box of instant stuffing maybe. Nothing extravagant.
Many of the things I am saying to you here today,
distinguish members of this panel, my son has been unaware of
until today. I am not in the habit of telling my 9-year-old the
status of our finances. Wyatt is on the free breakfast and
lunch program at school so this helps during the school year.
But during the summer months and days when school is not in
session it is a different story. I am sure that any of you that
have children or grandchildren know that feeding them three
times a day is a lot more expensive than feeding them once. And
if you are a parent such as myself and you cannot afford what
you need, you go without.
I ask you to think about something for a moment. Is it in
the best interest of my child to skip a meal and take the
chance on me getting ill? And what will happen to him if I do?
I am grateful for the food stamp benefits I receive, but at
the end of the month it is not enough. Have you ever seen a
child get excited when you tell them you have enough to get a
bag of apples or some grapes or even a kiwi? Wyatt does.
I am very proud of my son. He is on the honor roll, and I
want him to have a normal life. There are times when my son
wants a friend to come over to spend the night, but
unfortunately I have to make an excuse because I do not have
enough food to feed them both. It is not my son's fault that he
lives in a single-parent home in a trailer park. I am very good
at keeping things hidden from him and even those outside our
front door.
Times are hard, and I am grateful for the program, and it
makes life truly better for me and my son and the tens of
millions of people like us who participate. And on behalf of
all of us who receive the food stamps each month, I want to
thank you for your support. I urge your leadership to make it a
better program by increasing the amount of food stamp benefits
people receive each month so that we can purchase the
nutritious foods that are so important to good health and well-
being. This will allow us to eat every day and not go hungry
when our limited benefits run out.
In closing, in addition to my personal experience with the
program, I would like to tell you about my job duties as a
counselor using the Benefit Bank, a Web-based program that
allows people in similar situations to complete applications
for public benefits such as food stamps. The people that I help
are usually parents like myself who have fallen on hard times.
They tell me they are forced to make the difficult choice
between buying food or paying their rent. It gives me great
pride to be able to help people who cannot ask for help because
they do not think they understand. I tell them I know and that
it is OK to ask for help.
Thank you for taking this time from your busy schedule to
listen to my story, and I would be pleased to answer any
questions at this time.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Stewart can be found on page
128 in the appendix.]
Chairman Harkin. Ms. Stewart, thank you very much for a
very powerful, powerful statement. Thanks for putting a human
face on all these statistics we see all the time and reminding
us that the policies we are discussing affect real people and
not just numbers on a piece of paper. So we really appreciate
your being here.
We will have a quick round of questions. I wanted to start
with Mr. Nilsen. On the subject of trafficking--we have had
great reductions in the amount of Food Stamp trafficking, as
you testified to, as we know, again, from the numbers and
statistics. However, trafficking in small grocery stores
remains at 7.6 cents per dollar as compared to just 0.2 cents
per dollar in large stores. What caused this difference? What
is it about the small stores that needs more attention and
improvement to combat food stamp trafficking?
Mr. Nilsen. A couple things, Mr. Chairman. First of all, I
think trafficking is higher because there is less oversight in
a small store. These small stores tend to be stand-alone stores
without a lot of oversight, no checking, few audits. They are
not like a grocery store that has systems in place, automated
cashiers, cash registers that track everything. So it is a lot
easier to traffic in a small operation.
Our view is that FNS needs to be more proactive in
screening stores and when they let stores into the system,
particularly in the first year or so, use the EBT system to
look at the volume of transactions and have the resources to go
in and see what is really going on.
We saw one instance where a store had estimated that it was
going to redeem about $180,000 in food stamps in a year, and
within 3 months it was trafficking over $200,000 in food stamp
benefits in a month. This store then was shut down, lost its
license, but it took a number of months. I think it was about
$690,000 in food stamp benefits it redeemed in a matter of 6
months. That store only lost its license. The person's ability
to redeem food stamps was taken away. Very often, in cases like
that the store is then transferred to other ownership.
Sometimes trafficking then starts all over again.
So FNS, we feel, needs to use the data that it has more
proactively to monitor particularly these small operations.
Chairman Harkin. Thank you very much, Mr. Nilsen.
Mr. Greenstein, why this rapid rise in food stamp receipts
by working families? Why do we have this rise by working
families? Do you have any ideas on what you would attribute
that to?
Mr. Greenstein. Well, two things. First off, we have had an
increase in the number of working families with low incomes
below the poverty line, so more have been eligible. If you look
at the percentage of eligible working poor families getting
food stamps, it has gone from about 46 percent in 2000 to about
51 percent in the most recent data. That is a significant
increase, but I would submit that 51 percent--these are people
who are working for low wages, playing by the rules, raising
their children in poverty. We ought to be able to do better
than that. And I think there are some things you could do, the
Committee could do, that could really address that.
There is the issue of simplification, which we talked
about, but there is also this issue of benefit costs. The USDA
studies show that families, to get on food stamps, when they
apply, have an average of two and a half visits in the food
stamp office and an average of 5 hours of time. Now, if you are
a family working for low wages and the employer does not give
you time off to go to the welfare office to apply, this is a
real barrier to participation, particularly if the benefits you
get in return for what may be lost wages are quite modest.
So I think you need to make further progress. I would urge
looking at both sides of the equation. We need more
simplification, but we also need to deal with the benefit side.
And as I noted earlier, the key issue that really concerns me
here is that the benefits are continuing to decline in food
purchasing power.
Years ago, in the 1977 Food Stamp Act, a number of
deductions that were designed to reflect the impact of certain
expenses of families' disposable incomes and ability to buy
food were replaced with a standard deduction which was indexed
for inflation because the costs that they are reflecting rise
with inflation.
The indexation was taken away in 1996 and restored in a
partial way in 2002. So where we are now is that deduction is
indexed for families of four or more. For families of three, I
think it will be until 2014 until indexation resumes. For
families of two, it will be 2025 under current law until
indexation resumes. For the 80 percent of food stamp households
that are households of three or fewer, the benefits are eroding
in food purchasing power each year, and the tradeoff between
the time you have got to take off from work and put in to apply
and what you get in return is going in an unfavorable direction
with each passing year.
So I think if you both simplified the program and dealt
with this problem in the standard deduction, we could make
further progress and do better than having 49 percent of
eligible working poor families left out of the program.
Chairman Harkin. Well, as I said, there is a rapid rise in
working families, but as you correctly point out, it is still
way below the national average.
Mr. Greenstein. It is way below the national average, and
part of the rise again is because more families are eligible
because wages have been eroding at the bottom of the wage
scale, pushing more people into the food stamp eligibility
category.
Chairman Harkin. Ms. Stewart, I want to pick up on what Bob
just said about the complexity of the food stamp program and
the length of time it takes to file and receive benefits. How
much paperwork do you have to bring to the local food stamp
office? You have to go there, you say, regularly because your
income varies from month to month because of child support
payments. Give us some idea of what you go through each time
you visit. And you are working all the time. How do you find
the time to go to the food stamp office and go through all the
paperwork? Could you describe that?
Ms. Stewart. Well, fortunately, my employer does allow me
to take the time off. I know some people cannot get the time
off to go. Their employer will not let them. However, I do not
get paid when I go. It can take me sometimes up to 2 hours. And
I know that does not seem like a lot, but when I miss 2 hours
of work, that is $20 out of my pocket. And for me, you know,
that is filling up my gas tank for the week. That could be a
new pair of shoes for my son. Or that could be what I need to
keep my utilities from getting turned off. So for me to have to
go back--and I usually have to go back like every 3 months
because of my child support varying. And getting everything
together, I have to have check stubs for all that time, current
electric bill, current rent. Even though my rent stays the same
and has for the past 8 years, I have to take that every time I
go, and it has to be current.
Chairman Harkin. Thank you very much, Ms. Stewart, I will
now turn to Senator Chambliss.
Senator Chambliss. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Ms. Stewart, with respect to having to return to the food
stamp office to update your income reports, I realize that most
food stamp recipients do not have the ability to go online to
make those reports, but maybe folks who are working in offices
would have that capability.
In your case, would you be able to do that? Could you go
online to do something like that if we were able to work out
some mechanism for online reporting?
Ms. Stewart. Yes, sir, I could. Most public libraries also
have Internet access with computers there that you could go at
your own schedule. Most of them are open until 9 o'clock at
night, so when you get off work, I just take what I need to
input into the online system, and I can go to the public
library and do that. And some schools even offer access to
parents after school hours.
Senator Chambliss. So going online would be pretty feasible
for you personally.
Ms. Stewart. Yes, sir, that would be excellent because then
I would not have to take the time off work to do that.
Senator Chambliss. OK. Mr. Dostis, as a nutritionist, in
your capacity as a nutritionist, let me ask you: One complaint
I constantly hear from folks who are standing in line in the
grocery store behind food stamp beneficiaries is that that the
types of things that they are buying are obviously not the most
nutritional. They are buying candy, they are buying popcorn,
instead of buying cereal or meat or whatever.
Are there any statistics on this to show whether or not
folks who are really buying what they ought to be buying to
provide nutritional means? Or is this something that there is
no way to track?
Mr. Dostis. I think the major issue that families face--and
we heard that from Mrs. Stewart--is the benefit level that food
stamps offers. If you have $1 and you go into a supermarket,
you know you have to feed your family, and you have a choice
between buying one piece of fruit, or maybe two if you are
lucky, or three boxes of macaroni and cheese or five or six
packages of those soups that come in packages that are really
inexpensive but that are filling, you are going to buy the more
filling stuff. Because when you are hungry, when there is not
enough food in the house, you try to stretch those dollars as
much as you can. And the foods that you are buying are the less
nutritious foods, but they are doing the job and filling you
up.
If we really want to address improving the quality of the
meals that people are eating who are on tight budgets, then we
have to provide more resources. So that is the answer.
Now, every so often, you will see--and I have heard those
same stories, too. You know, it is hard to know exactly what
stage a family is in when they are buying something. If you see
a family with some soda and cake in there, who am I to judge?
Maybe they are having a birthday party. I do not know.
What I hear from the front lines, from the people who are
on food stamps, is that they make the best choices they can
make. They know how to stretch those dollars very well, but
they are limited in their capacity in terms of what they can do
in terms of buying those good foods, because the top-line
foods, the foods that many of us take for granted, you know,
protein foods, vegetables, whole grains, they are out of reach.
Senator Chambliss. Mr. Nilsen, in your testimony regarding
the trafficking of food stamps, you mentioned that there are
some stores that traffic food stamps repeatedly under different
owners. Is there evidence of any collusion between the buyers
and the sellers on this issue?
Mr. Nilsen. To traffic, there has to be. Basically, you
have two willing parties. You have the vendor, who is willing
to trade cash for the benefits, and you have the person with
the food stamp EBT card willing to trade in order to get cash
so they can spend it on things that food stamps are not
eligible for.
So, to that extent, yes, there is collusion. What usually
happens is FNS turns over a list of the names of participants
who have been using that particular store to the State, and it
is up to the State to follow up, talking to the participants.
Some States follow up; others do not.
Senator Chambliss. You mentioned in your testimony that the
food stamp payment error rates have reached an all-time low,
but there are also some remaining causes of payment error in
the program. Would you expand on the source of the remaining
errors?
Mr. Nilsen. The complexity of the program continues to
create errors. If you look at the total number of errors,
again, two-thirds of them are the result of caseworkers either
inputting data wrong, not inputting data that they have
gotten--for example, when somebody reports an income change in
a timely way--which then creates an error. Or they just do not
understand the rules and do not input that data correctly.
Also, on the participant side, if people cannot get into
the office, about 30 percent of the errors is a result of
participants not reporting information in a timely way.
But, together, 43 percent is failure to act on information,
or a caseworker is using information incorrectly. So complexity
is still an issue with the Food Stamp Program, even since the
changes to simplify from the 2002 farm bill.
Senator Chambliss. Mr. Greenstein, I appreciate your
comments about the asset limit issue, and this is obviously
going to be a budget issue for us, in addition to just a
practical issue. The asset limits are so out of date. If we are
going to do a good job of serving the people in the best way,
we have got to try to figure out some way to do this.
I would just ask you--and you may have something off the
top of your head, or you may need to get back with us. But do
you have any thoughts about how we can be more cost-effective
in raising the asset limits?
Mr. Greenstein. As you say, this is a tough issue. There
are costs involved. Had the current asset limits, which I think
were last set in 1985 or 1986, kept pace with inflation, the
$2,000 limit would be close to $4,000 today. I doubt you are
going to have room in your allocation to make that up. I would
hope you could do better than what I am about to suggest, but
at a bare minimum, at least indexing what we have now so it
does not erode for another 20 years as it has eroded now.
I also think the proposal the President made last year was
quite important to exempt retirement accounts from the asset
test. We have a complicated, irrational system now. If your
employer has a defined benefit plan, it is exempt. If it is a
defined contribution plan, most are exempt, but not all. If you
have a 401(k), maybe you have $4,500 in it, a tiny amount, and
you are laid off in a recession, planners are going to
recommend, not that you liquidate that account and have nothing
for old age, but that you roll it over into an IRA. The minute
you roll it over, it starts counting in food stamps, and you
have to completely wipe out your retirement account. The
recession is over, you are starting at zero.
So I think this is why the administration has recommended
changing that. It is something that is supported across the
political spectrum. I know the Heritage Foundation is
supportive of making that change as well.
At retirement analysts--the White House had a summit on
retirement security last year, and as you can imagine, with
issues from Social Security to others, there were many areas of
disagreement. An area of unanimity, everyone there, regardless
of where they were on the political spectrum, every retirement
analyst thought the current treatment of retirement accounts in
the asset test made no sense and should be reformed.
Senator Chambliss. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Harkin. Thank you, Senator Chambliss.
Senator Cochran?
Senator Cochran. Mr. Chairman, thank you.
Mr. Greenstein, I can remember when you first came to this
Committee and talked about this program and helped us analyze
it and develop the provisions in it, and we appreciate over the
years your continued assistance and advice and counsel. It has
been very helpful to the Committee.
I also just want to thank all of the members of the panel
for being here today and helping us take a look at this program
and determine ways to make it more efficient, to make it more
beneficial to the people who need the food assistance that this
program provides.
I think my State probably has a higher percentage of
population participating in this program than any State in the
Union, so I feel it is an important obligation that I have to
try to make sure we are getting the most out of the program and
it is delivering the most benefits that we can deliver to the
people entitled to participate.
A couple things came to mind as I was listening to your
testimony, and I will direct this first question to Mr.
Greenstein. What changes do you think would be important for
the Committee to consider as we prepare to reauthorize the Food
Stamp Program? You have already answered that now since I wrote
that down. But is there anything else that comes to mind that
you could recommend to us?
Mr. Greenstein. Well, I think in each of the three broad
areas I mentioned, there are specific proposals, and I know you
have time constraints so I will not go into every one. But
there are a variety of things. We have just talked about the
asset test. We have mentioned the issue of the standard
deduction. Without trying to get too technical, if one simply
for all household sizes set the standard deduction at 10
percent of the poverty line--and the poverty line varies by
family size, and it is adjusted for inflation--that would
really address that particular issue.
Another part of the program that has eroded due to
inflation is the minimum benefit, which is important for the
elderly and disabled poor.
Two other things I alluded to quickly in the testimony that
I will maybe just take a tiny bit more time on.
The Senate and the House have been in different places from
1996 through the present, through 2002, and sadly, the House
has prevailed until now in each of those differences, on how
restrictive to be for low-income workers who are not raising
minor children and are below the poverty line or working hard.
You know, the current rules limit the benefits to 3 months out
of every 3 years while they are out of work. That goes well
beyond what the Senate passed. Each time you have done food
stamps, that had been the House position. It really needs to be
revisited. It really is too severe.
And, finally, we are increasingly concerned about both the
complexity and the effect of where we are now with the
immigrant rules. We made a change, and we have made a series of
patches. We have a very complicated set of rules. I think there
ought to be one set of rules for legal permanent residents who
are poor enough to qualify. Anyone who is undocumented or is
here temporarily, you should not get food stamps. If you are
here legally and you otherwise qualify, let's have one simple
set of rules rather than these complicated ones, different
parts of families are dealt with differently.
I think all of those would be changes that would be
helpful, along with the simplifications that we have been
talking about. And I think Senator Chambliss' point about
promoting more online--enabling people to do more in a modern
technological age where you do not have to take time off from
your job and lose $20 to stand in line at the food stamp office
to provide new information, that would be an important set of
issues to address, as well.
Senator Cochran. I am not aware of the exact amount that is
spent on the administration of the program, but it has to be a
considerable sum. I may ask this question to Mr. Nilsen. Have
you thought about or has anybody undertaken a review of how we
could improve the efficiency of the program in terms of
reducing the costs of administration so we can make more of the
funds that are appropriated for this program actually available
to the beneficiaries in the form of food nutrition assistance?
Mr. Nilsen. We have not specifically been asked to look at
the administration of the program. I think the Federal share of
administration is about $2.6 billion currently. But we are
currently looking at what States are doing to facilitate access
to the program. As Mr. Greenstein said and Ms. Stewart said,
there are numerous things that can be done to use technology to
make it simpler for people to apply and to update. And so we
will get some information out of the current study which we are
doing for the Committee at this time. But I think there is more
that can be looked at in terms of applying technology to
simplify the administration of the program because, again, as I
said, many of the errors are caused by the complexity itself,
by caseworkers misapplying information. If there is better
software to handle that information, if instead of being
inputted and read a couple times and re-inputted, if it could
be directly input by the participant, it would be a lot more
efficient.
Senator Cochran. Mr. Greenstein and Mr. Dostis and Ms.
Stewart, do you have any other comments on that question, if
you do have suggestions? Or if you think of something later,
you can submit them in writing for the record.
Mr. Dostis. In Vermont, we have had a 28-percent increase
in food stamp participation since 2001, and that is a concerted
effort on behalf of my organization and many of our partners to
do outreach.
One of the things we implemented, and that was thanks to a
food stamp outreach grant that we received, was creating a
website where people can go to learn about the Food Stamp
Program. They can plug in their numbers, their financial
numbers, and find out if they may qualify. And it gives them
some sense of whether they should even go down the road. And
then they are able to communicate with us directly with any of
their questions, and there is a 1-800 number so we can respond
to any immediate questions. But it cuts a lot of the time, and
it encourages people to use technologies to find out if they
are eligible. And the access points are--like Mrs. Stewart
pointed out, you know, if they do not have a computer at home,
then it is libraries.
So I think it is the wave of the future. Investments in
technology need to happen. We are seeing some of that in
Vermont, and I think there are many more opportunities that
exist in that realm.
Senator Cochran. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Harkin. Thank you very much, Senator Salazar?
Senator Salazar. Thank you very much, Chairman Harkin. I
appreciate your holding this hearing on this very important
title of the farm bill. I have a question for Mr. Nilsen
concerning the payment errors and trafficking.
I know that in the findings of the GAO, what you found is
that there has been a significant decline, I think from 9.86
percent in 1999 to 5.84 percent in 2005. And I don't remember
this exact figure, but I think from some of the conversations
we had on this Committee last year, we were looking at spending
about 51 percent on nutrition programs out of the entire budget
for the farm bill. So I look at a $100 billion program, some
$50 billion of that being spent on nutrition. And I think that
if you look at a 5.84 percent error rate, you are probably
talking--it is at least a several billion dollar amount that is
still being expended via error or some kind of trafficking.
My question to you--we are going to think about a lot of
priorities, I am sure, in this Committee as we go through the
farm bill and try to figure out what we want to do on renewable
energy and biofuels and a whole host of other things. But if we
were to look at how we could bring that number down from 5.84
percent to, say, half of that, what would be your top three
recommendations that we as a Committee ought to look at as we
try to halve the error rate?
Mr. Nilsen. A couple things. First of all, the current
estimated error rate translates to about $1.7 billion, so that
is still a lot of money. Had it not been reduced, it would have
been over a billion dollars higher, so a significant amount of
progress has been made.
But I think because two-thirds of the errors are caused by
caseworkers and by the difficulty, particularly for working
families, of reporting information in a timely way, I think
continuing to simplify the program could continue to bring the
error rate down; the introduction of additional technology to
help people report that information quickly, easily; and also
for caseworkers to handle the information. If you have good
technology software that puts the information in the right
context and analyzes it correctly, then it reduces the error
rate.
Part of the problem is there is a lot of turnover in
caseworkers, and it is a very complex program, so it is hard to
learn the rules and exactly how to administer the program. So
that is where the substitution of technology can help bring the
error rate down, I believe.
Senator Salazar. Let me push you on the caseworker
enhancement concept that you were just talking about. Describe
to us how a caseworker is part of, if you will, the error that
occurs at the front end when somebody is entering into the
system food stamps and what it is that you would do with
respect to that caseworker to try to upgrade the skills so that
you do not have those problems.
Mr. Nilsen. Well, as Mr. Greenstein was saying, how do you
handle certain assets? If you are a particular kind of person,
you will handle it one way. If you are somebody else, it is a
different way. If the asset, for example, changes from a 401(k)
and you roll it over into a regular mutual fund, all of a
sudden it is no longer an excluded asset. So there is a lot of
delving in that interview to find out exactly how to handle
people's income, their deductions, their assets. And that is
where the complexity comes in.
Senator Salazar. For both you, Mr. Nilsen, and Mr.
Greenstein, if you look at the concept of simplification so
that you can avoid errors by having caseworkers being able to
go through the process in a more simple way and applicants also
to understand more what it is that they are--the information
that they are providing, what recommendations would you make to
the Committee in terms of simplification, Mr. Greenstein?
Mr. Greenstein. Simplification I think is very important.
You know, I am remembering the first error rate report we
issued when I went into the Department, and it was like March
or April 1977. And the combination of the payments to
ineligible households and overpayments to eligible households
was 17 percent of benefits issue. Today it is 4.5 percent. The
5.8 also includes the underpayments.
What has changed since then? Probably the single biggest
factor is simplification in technology, so one wants to keep
pushing there.
There are more things you can do. We have talked about
simplifying the asset rules, simplifying the immigrant rules.
In 2002, you simplified the reporting rules for working
families. We can go farther and look at simplifying the
reporting rules more for elderly households as well.
But I want to make a caveat. In a program this large, it is
going to be harder to drive the error rate much below 4.5
percent--we can get it some with more simplification--unless
another issue is dealt with that, to a large degree, is outside
your control, and that is, States administer the program, the
Federal Government pays half the administrative costs. In a
number of States, they have cut back significantly in recent
years as a budget matter on the number of caseworkers and have
not fully invested in all the new information technology that
is available because of the costs.
So some of the technology that is there today is not being
fully used, and in a number of States, the number of clients
per caseworker is too high, and that contributes to caseworkers
making the errors that Mr. Nilsen talked about.
Now, I do not have a magic-bullet answer for what to do
about that. It is probably worth our all thinking more about
that as you go into reauthorization. But inadequate State
staffing and investment in IT is one of the contributing
factors here.
Senator Salazar. Just one more question, if I may. Are
there some States that you could hold out, Mr. Nilsen, as
stellar States that are great examples of having cut down the
error rate below this 4.65 percent? Because it depends a lot on
the budget issue that Mr. Greenstein was talking about.
Mr. Nilsen. What we found in our study is that a lot of the
States sort of did a number of things, and some things that
worked in some States like California maybe were not the things
that brought the error rate down in Illinois. Very often it was
State by State.
Looking at some of the dramatic changes, Illinois,
Michigan, I believe, and California had dramatic declines in
their error rates. But they had to do a range of things. A lot
of it was targeting on those areas where the error rate was the
highest in the sub-State, and then to go in--as I said, in
California there was a lot of training of caseworkers that was
done. There was a lot of targeting of resources, education, and
really focusing on processing more quickly the information they
got and making it a priority. That was something else that
changed: making bringing down the error rate a priority. For a
long time, I think it came down from probably 17 percent early
on to around 10 percent, but then it was hard to budge from
that level for many years. But they have made a lot of progress
since the 2002 farm bill.
Senator Salazar. Thank you very much.
Chairman Harkin. Thank you, Senator Lincoln?
Senator Lincoln. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you so
much for bringing us here today to discuss what is, I think,
one of the most critical issues before our country. And it is
certainly the issue of hunger among working families and any of
our citizens. The important role that our Federal Food
Assistance Program plays in the lives of America's working
families is critical, and I think we often underestimate
oftentimes because we do take for granted the wonderful,
wonderful country that we live in, that it has an impact on so
many things, whether it is certainly the health of our
children, the cost of health care in general and long term, the
ability of our children to learn, to pay attention, to be able
to reach their potential. It is very important.
It is a timely discussion we are having here in the
Committee. It prepares us for the always difficult task of
crafting a new farm bill, and I certainly look forward to
working more on this title and looking at how we can make
improvements.
We are enormously grateful to our panel that is here today
for sharing with us. I would like to take one point of personal
privilege here and just quickly address something that I have
been very involved with.
Many may know that Senator Gordon Smith and I, along with
Senator Durbin and Senator Elizabeth Dole, started the Hunger
Caucus, the Senate Hunger Caucus, in 2004 to really highlight
the importance of these issues that we are discussing this
morning and really to provide a more organized voice for the
anti-hunger community here on Capitol Hill and to speak out.
We currently have over one-third of the Senate represented
in the caucus, including our Chairman, which we are grateful to
you for your involvement. And I wanted to take this opportunity
particularly to encourage our new members who have joined us in
the Senate this session to join our Hunger Caucus because we
have done some incredible things, and we are going to continue
to do those things. So we appreciate that.
I want to especially thank our panel, but, Ms. Stewart, I
want to thank you so much for bringing, as the Chairman
mentioned, a real face to what we are talking about here.
Oftentimes we try to express that as well, and I want to say
thank you for being here. Thank you for bringing your son,
Wyatt. I know that was not an easy decision. It is difficult. I
have 10-year-old twins, both of which were sick last week and
both of which came to work with me last week. It is a tough
choice that we make, and it is . hat I appreciate and certainly
respect you for.
The other thing I just wanted to point out that I do not
know has been pointed out in the Committee was from Ms.
Stewart's testimony. Ms. Stewart is not only working diligently
to provide for her son and to do so in a way that is remarkable
in terms of his health and well-being and his education. But if
you look at the opening of her statement, her written
testimony, she is also president of the PTA, she is a Sunday
school teacher, a chartered chairperson for the local Cub Scout
pack, a band booster for the school. She assists with the
cheerleading competition, and she is a food stamp recipient.
She is not only taking care of her son, but she is contributing
enormously to the community and the village that raises
everyone's children in her community. And I just think that is
so important, Mr. Chairman, that we note the tremendous gift
that Ms. Stewart is giving to her community and to the other
children and the families that exist there.
When we look at the fact that the nutrition title in the
farm bill takes up 60 percent of all the spending in the farm
bill, roughly 60 percent, and yet we recognize those that are
eligible for food stamps that are not even accessing them, it
should be overwhelming to us that this is an issue that exists
in this country that has to be dealt with for the future of our
country and its well-being and the children who are our future
and our future leaders.
So I want to commend you because I have got to tell you, I
work with the PTA and several of these others, between the Cub
Scouts and other things, and it is not an easy task. And my hat
is off to you for the incredible contribution that you give to
your country from that respect.
Ms. Stewart. Thank you.
Senator Lincoln. I would like to touch on what I just
mentioned there in terms of eligibility. Some 50 percent of
eligible working families and 30 percent of eligible low-income
seniors do not participate. Those figures do vary among
different States, and that has been discussed a little bit. My
own State beats the national average by serving 68 percent of
all eligible and 60 percent of working families. But,
unfortunately, a number of States do considerably worse than
the national average. And I guess may you could answer, any of
you all. Mr. Dostis, you mentioned some of the things you all
have done in Vermont to really increase the participation and
make sure that that availability is out there for individuals.
But the disparity between States and how it exists, is there a
better way that perhaps we could--and maybe we already are and
I am unaware of it--providing collocation for access to food
stamps, particularly for our elderly? We have a
disproportionate number of elderly in Arkansas. They are
disproportionately low-income and in need of assistance. I do
not know if collocation of being able to access those benefits
through the area agency on aging and others things is as easy
and as appropriate as it should be.
But anything that we have learned from high-performing
States or anything else that you all could recommend? I know
Mr. Dostis has shared with us some of what Vermont does.
Mr. Dostis. I would say that the key is outreach. There is
a lot of misconceptions about the Food Stamp Program. I think
of seniors who do not understand its entitlement nature, and
they assume if they take, then they are taking from someone
else. So just to reach out to them, let them know they can have
it and they are not taking it from someone else.
Families who are working and increasingly, as you have
heard, more families are struggling, working families are
struggling, and that is where we are seeing an increase in
participation in food shelves as well as requests for the Food
Stamp Program.
But it is very difficult for working families to take off,
as you heard from Mrs. Stewart, to apply for and sustain
themselves on that program.
There are misconceptions about the benefit levels, so doing
outreach will help people understand to what extent the program
can be beneficial to them, but we have to do it in a way that
makes it as easy for them as possible to find out that
information.
Senator Lincoln. Is there something that we can provide the
States? I noticed you, Mr. Greenstein--I think it was Mr.
Greenstein--mentioned that the States have cut back on their
caseworkers, their technology, or the investment in technology.
Is there something there that we could provide them as an
incentive perhaps?
Mr. Greenstein. I think that is certainly something we can
look at. I do not have a specific recommendation there, but I
think that is worth looking at.
Following up on Mr. Dostis' comment and your question,
where we have a real problem, whether it is for working
families or the elderly, or whoever, is that you go to one
office and you apply for Medicaid. Two months later, you are
called in for food stamps. You have to go over here for child
care.
Senator Lincoln. Right.
Mr. Greenstein. And to the degree that there are
conflicting rules in the program, it is hard to align. To the
degree that States can align the rules, it makes it possible to
do more of the one-stop shopping, which can really help.
Some of the changes you made in 2002 really enabled States
to more closely align the programs, but we need to look for
additional opportunities in that regard.
And with regard to the elderly--and maybe this is something
you can talk with the Finance Committee about--we ought to be
more systematic about if seniors are signing up for the low-
income drug benefit in Part D of Medicare, let's refer them and
hook them into food stamps if they are eligible and vice versa.
We have seniors that need the drug benefit that are not signed
up, that have misconceptions about the problems with the drug
benefit as well, a number of which have now been resolved. But
we ought to look for opportunities like that rather than having
these individual silos where you sign up for one program, you
go through the hoops, and you are not hooked up with another.
And for people who are older and frail and it is hard to get
around, that could really help.
I think there are particular opportunities to look at in
the interface between the low-income subsidies for the
prescription drug benefit and food stamps.
Senator Lincoln. That is a great suggestion, Mr. Chairman,
and I hope we will reach out to other committees and other
programs that exist. I know that we tried to do that with
Social Security and veterans' benefits, and it was like pulling
teeth to get the two agencies to talk and figure out how we
could make sure that as veterans came for certain programs in
Social Security, they could still see what was available to
them through the Veterans Administration. But it certainly
makes a lot of sense, and I know that for us in Arkansas, once
we did make it one-stop shopping, particularly for children,
whether it was vaccinations or other things that they could
sign up for, we saw a real difference in terms of what was
actually getting out to children through programs. So I really
appreciate that.
Mr. Greenstein. And, of course, you are on both
Committees--Finance and----
Senator Lincoln. Exactly.
[Laughter.]
Chairman Harkin. I was going to say, your comments were
well placed.
Senator Lincoln. Well, I have been noting your tax comments
as well in terms of what we can do there.
I believe my time has expired, Mr. Chairman, but I do thank
you so much for bringing this issue up, and you have brought a
great panel.
Chairman Harkin. Thank you, Senator Lincoln.
Your comments were well placed there, Mr. Greenstein.
[Laughter.]
Chairman Harkin. Thank you very much to panel one. As I
said, we have a couple of votes at 11:30, so we are going to
have to move ahead. Thank you. You are excused. We appreciate
your input and look forward to further contact with you as we
develop this title of the farm bill.
Chairman Harkin. Now we will ask our second panel to come
to the table: Bill Bolling, Luanne Francis, Melinda Newport,
and Frank Kubik.
For the benefit of the Senators who are diligent in
remaining here, hopefully we will try to get off the Senate
floor, maybe, Saxby, sometime after a vote and try to get a
quorum to report out our funding resolution and stuff. So we
will try to do that.
I will recognize Senator Chambliss for the purpose of an
introduction here.
Senator Chambliss. Well, I mentioned my friend Bill Bolling
in my opening comments, but since he is here on this panel, let
me just say again, Bill, welcome to the panel.
Bill is the Executive Director of the Atlanta Food Bank,
and he truly is an amazing American with what he has done, not
just in the Atlanta area but the whole metro area surrounding
Atlanta. Today, Bill runs 18-wheelers in and out of his
facility, both bringing food in that comes straight off the
grocery store shelves. He has developed a relationship with
major manufacturers as well as retailers for the contribution
of food products to his facility. He then returns those 18-
wheelers out delivering food products around the metro area in
Atlanta.
In addition to that, Mr. Chairman, he now has moved into
providing school supplies for school children by allowing
teachers to come in and literally take school supplies that
are, again, 100 percent donated and gives kids who do not have
pencils and paper and crayons, the opportunity to have not only
nutritious meals but also school supplies.
It is an unbelievable operation that Bill has put together,
and I am very pleased that he is here today to share some
thoughts with us on this critical issue. So welcome, Bill.
Mr. Bolling. Thank you.
Chairman Harkin. Thank you for that great introduction. In
fact, Senator Chambliss has talked to me about you, and I look
forward to visiting your enterprise down there sometime soon, I
hope.
Mr. Bolling. Thank you.
Chairman Harkin. Mr. Bolling, please proceed. Again, we are
going to try to keep it to 5 minutes or so. I would sure
appreciate it. We have, as I said, two votes at 11:30.
STATEMENT OF BILL BOLLING, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, ATLANTA
COMMUNITY FOOD BANK, ATLANTA, GEORGIA
Mr. Bolling. I understand. Thank you, Senator Chambliss,
for the introduction and taking time to come to visit us. Thank
you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank you for the opportunity to
be here. I am the Executive Director of the Atlanta Community
Food Bank, and I am not only representing my food bank and the
eight food banks in Georgia, but the Nation's Food Bank
Network, America's Second Harvest, that serves over 50,000
community-based organizations.
I have been a food bank director for 27 years and have been
feeding the hungry for 32 years. I was one of the first
directors to actually help start the Second Harvest Food Bank.
I have seen a dramatic increase in the problem of hunger and
the complexity of hunger and poverty, not only in Georgia but
throughout the country. As the problem has grown, the profiles
of the people affected by the threat of hunger have changed.
Today, most people are off of welfare. A large percentage have
a job, sometimes two jobs, but they are challenged to find
affordable housing, adequate health care, and enough to eat.
As we look back over the past few years, something
interesting has happened. Food bank partner agencies that used
to provide emergency food relief are now opening their doors to
the same families over and over again. Agencies that used to
focus only on providing meals and groceries are providing a
range of services today. For many low-income working families,
food banks and their partner agencies are the last defense
against hunger. It is because the network of food banks and
relief agencies in their communities exist that people are able
to face the heart-wrenching decision to forego a trip to the
grocery store in order to pay rent or utilities, and we just
heard that in the last briefing.
The people we serve are struggling every day to make ends
meet. The local agency system in North Georgia and around the
country is largely composed of faith-based entities, with
three-fourths of our agencies made up of community support from
churches, synagogues, temples and mosques. These local relief
agencies reflect the very best of America, the broad array of
America's social fabric and religious life. And they are a
reflection of the public and private sector successfully
working together to address a major public health challenge. In
fact, they are in my mind a strong part of our national
security system, neighbors knowing and helping neighbors.
We rely heavily on volunteers in our network of food banks.
Volunteer labor in our network in any typical week is estimated
at $8.2 million. These volunteers do not just ladle soup and
pack food boxes. They provide additional support to needy
families. Oftentimes, food and hunger is just the presenting
problem. Partner agencies provide school tutoring, community
support to seniors, counseling and training for jobs,
nutritional counseling which is so important, housing support,
mental health services, and an array of other support services
that transform lives.
Using a commodity that our country has in abundance--food--
we are able to engage, educate, and empower people. This is the
essential role that food programs provide every day--to
transform lives to those most in need.
I understand in the upcoming farm bill the choices are
going to be tough and the competing interests many. But in
TEFAP and other commodity donation programs, we clearly find
mutual and compound interests. They are to serve as a
nutritional safety net for millions of our Nation's hungry.
TEFAP commodities offer some of the healthiest and most
nutritious food distributed to our agencies. TEFAP commodities
stabilize our distribution when private donations are lagging
or can help extend private donations enabling food to mix and
be more complete.
I know my colleagues on this panel have spoken quite
eloquently about the needs to improve and sustain the Food
Stamp Program. I only want to add to that testimony and say
that we stand ready to work with this Committee and welfare and
food stamp offices around the country.
If I were sitting in your shoes with more requests than
resources, my main concern would be whether money committed to
feeding hungry people can leverage private money, food, and
support. I am here to tell you that it does and it can be
continued with your support. This is a place where resources
committed multiply many, many times over, a place where people
come together and strengthen and nurture community. This is a
place where money and food make a tremendous difference. It is
a network of public and private agencies that work at so many
different levels to transform the lives of both the giver and
the receiver. It is a system that works on many different
levels, and it deserves our full support.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Bolling can be found on page
53 in the appendix.]
Chairman Harkin. Thank you very much, Mr. Bolling, for,
again, a very powerful statement.
Now we turn to Luanne Francis, the Program Manager at
Kingsley House, which is a social service agency in New Orleans
that provides help to families throughout Southeast Louisiana.
Ms. Francis will be sharing some of her experiences working for
Kingsley House during Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.
Ms. Francis, welcome to the Committee. Please proceed.
STATEMENT OF LUANNE FRANCIS, PROGRAM MANAGER, HEALTH CARE FOR
ALL, KINGSLEY HOUSE, NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA
Ms. Francis. Thank you, and thank you for the opportunity
to speak before you today. I welcome the opportunity to appear
before you not only on behalf of Kingsley House but on behalf
of New Orleans and Louisiana families, in particular to speak
about the Food Stamp Program and the Disaster Food Stamp
Program and the role they played in the lives of families in
Louisiana and continue to play today.
It is my hope that after this hearing you will understand
even more why the 2007 farm bill is an opportunity for you to
allow many more families across America to be lifted out of
hunger and to have the resources they need to recover when
disaster strikes.
We have all heard and seen the pictures of devastation
suffered by Gulf Coast families in the aftermath of Hurricanes
Katrina and Rita. I have lived it and continue to live it
today.
On August 29, 2005, 2 days before payday and 2 weeks after
school began for us, many of our families did not have the
resources to prepare for a disaster, and they were down to the
last of their food stamp dollars for that month.
In the months after the storm, the Disaster Food Stamp
Program was there for us when others were not. During a time of
loss and uncertainty, we did have access to food, and it did
not matter where we were, whether we were in Baton Rouge,
Texas, or Georgia. For many of us, though, the rebuilding was
only just beginning when the Disaster Food Stamp Program ended.
Today, Mr. Chairman, members of the Committee, 17 months
after Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast, families like the
Thompsons are still struggling with the resettlement and
recovery process, but it is not as easy to access the Food
Stamp Program as it was in the months following the storm. The
Thompsons had lost the home they were renting before the storm
and everything in it. Currently, they are staying with friends
while they are trying to find a place to live.
The New Orleans that we live in today and the Thompsons
live in is a place where the fair market rent has increased by
45 percent since before the hurricane, and child care costs are
increasing. Both Mr. and Mrs. Thompson work because one salary
will not help them pay moving costs for a new place, food,
child care, and all their household costs. Between work, trying
to find a place to live, and taking care of the children, the
Thompsons have not had time to do much else.
My staff and I met the Thompsons while we were out in the
community assessing families' needs, trying to connect them to
resources that were available to them. They had not applied for
food stamps because they thought that they would be ineligible
because they were working and because they did not live in
their own home.
Members of the Committee, Mr. Chairman, since June 2006 my
staff and I have enrolled over 500 individuals like the
Thompsons in the Food Stamp Program, and we have been able to
do this primarily because we were also able to assist families
in securing the documents they need to complete the application
process and because we can assist them in their home at a time
that is convenient to them, and they do not have to spend a day
at the Food Stamp Program and lose work, lose wages.
Food stamp benefits to a family of four that has a monthly
rent of $1,000 and child care costs between $300 and $400 a
month help a family stay healthy and probably escape
homelessness. Food stamps help to ensure families that their
basic need for food can be met while attending to the other
basics of our needs. If the same relaxed verification and
resources rules that operated in the months after the storm
could be extended beyond the 3 months, then many more families
would have the resources to rebuild and probably regain some
economic security. And the Thompson family is one of success
because we were able to help them enroll in the program.
There are many more families that cannot provide
documents--families, immigrant families who are legal, who have
lost naturalization certificates, and the time it takes to
regain that does not allow them to participate in the Food
Stamp Program. And the stories are endless.
Mr. Chairman, Committee members, I urge you to invest
resources in the 2007 farm bill that would allow families like
ours that are suffering now and others who suffer from
unemployment and other forms of economic hardship to access
those benefits without exhausting their resources, and giving
them an opportunity to build and regain some sense of self-
sufficiency.
Thank you for your time.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Francis can be found on page
67 in the appendix.]
Chairman Harkin. Thank you very much, Ms. Francis, not only
for your testimony but for being here and for all your great
work through the devastation in Louisiana.
Now we turn to Melinda Newport, Director of the Nutrition
Services for the Chickasaw Nation Health System. Ms. Newport
will be talking to us today about some of the unique food
insecurity and diet-related health challenges facing our Native
American population, particularly with respect to the Food
Distribution Program on Indian Reservations.
Ms. Newport, welcome to the Committee and please proceed.
STATEMENT OF MELINDA NEWPORT, DIRECTOR, NUTRITION SERVICES,
CHICKASAW NATION, ADA, OKLAHOMA
Ms. Newport. Thank you. Mr. Chairman and members of the
Committee, thank you for inviting me to testify today. My name
is Melinda Newport, and I am the Director of Nutrition Services
for the Chickasaw Nation. In this capacity, I administer eight
USDA Food and Nutrition Service programs for over 10,000
monthly participants. As a registered dietitian who has worked
at the local and national level on many challenging nutrition
issues for over 25 years, I have served as the president of the
National WIC Association and most recently president of the
National Association of Farmers Market Nutrition Programs. I
bring you greetings from Governor Bill Anoatubby of the
Chickasaw Nation, and I am accompanied today by Mr. Bill Lance,
administrator of our health system.
Chairman Harkin, I particularly appreciate your career-long
commitment to ensuring the viability, strength, and quality of
Federal nutrition programs, many of which benefit American
Indian Tribal Governments and their citizens. To provide the
Committee with additional perspective, there are 59 tribes,
most, if not all, reservation based, in 12 different States
represented by the Senators on this Committee today. The
cumulative tribal population is approximately half a million.
Senator Conrad, for instance, represents a State with large
land-based tribes and has five food distribution programs in
his State. Likewise, Senator Thune serves over 10,000 American
Indian citizens served by seven tribal programs in South
Dakota.
I cannot speak on behalf of every tribe's individual
requirements, but there is certainly an overarching need that
calls for continued support and innovation in the Nutrition and
Food Assistance Programs for Indian country.
With poverty being the principal factor causing food
insecurity, the Native American community suffers rates twice
as high as those of the normal U.S. population. Nearly one in
four Native American households is hungry or on the edge of
hunger. The fear of running out of food causes people to reduce
the quality of their diets or reduce the quantity of foods they
consume. Some families, as we have heard earlier, are forced to
rely on less expensive, often high-fat foods, and very few
fruits and vegetables.
As the Chairman mentioned, paradoxically at the same time
we experience hunger and food insecurity, obesity has been
declared an epidemic. Both obesity and hunger require solutions
that include regular access to nutritionally adequate food.
Additionally, guidance on proper selection and preparation of
foods is just as important.
Consequently, I urge the Committee to provide enhancements
that enable tribes to directly access programs through
government-to-government agreements and to allow flexibility to
implement programs in an innovative and culturally appropriate
manner. A specific example of a barrier that we need to address
is to provide a method in the Food Stamp Act for Tribal
Governments to directly access the Food Stamp Nutrition
Education Program through the Food Distribution Program.
Briefly, for those who may be less familiar, the Food
Distribution Program on Indian Reservations is an alternative
to food stamps, targeted to those living in more remote areas.
Just under 100 tribes administer the Food Distribution Program
for over 250 reservations or tribal jurisdictions. The program
has been enhanced in recent years through the addition of fresh
fruits and vegetables and frozen chicken and ground beef. We
need to continue to improve the nutritional quality of the food
package by offering foods that are lower in fat, higher in
whole grains, and lower in sugar and sodium content. Foods that
are convenient to serve and culturally appropriate are key with
the families that we serve today.
Many Food Distribution Programs continue to deliver
benefits from a truck 1 day per month at each site and do not
have adequate equipment to handle fresh produce or frozen
meats. Infrastructure funding for one-time expenses such as
these--to renovate a warehouse or to purchase equipment--would
help this program tremendously. I also urge the Committee to
expand funding for WIC and senior farmers market nutrition
programs to allow more tribes to participate and to provide
opportunities to include nutrition professionals in the Native
American nutrition programs, just as there is in the WIC
program, for example.
Given the improved state of health enjoyed by most
Americans, the lingering health disparity among American
Indians is most troubling. Investment by Federal nutrition
programs in foods of high nutritional quality and the
educational support to assist families in using those optimally
is far less costly than funding care for chronic diseases many
develop in the absence of sound nutritional status. Improving
the health and security of Native American families must be
ever present in the minds and hearts of Congress as they
establish policy.
I encourage you to do all you can to give voice to all
tribes to share with you the challenges they have in feeding
themselves and their families.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the Committee, and I
remain ready to answer questions or provide information as
needed.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Newport can be found on page
93 in the appendix.]
Chairman Harkin. Thank you, Ms. Newport.
Now we will turn to Frank Kubik, and I was just notified
that our 11:30 vote was moved, so we are not quite as rushed as
we were. That is what happens around this place.
Frank Kubik is the Commodity Supplemental Food Program
Manager at Focus: HOPE, a civil and human rights nonprofit
organization in Detroit, Michigan. Mr. Kubik, will be talking
to us today about his work at Focus: HOPE and the particular
challenge that senior Americans face in maintaining an adequate
diet.
Mr. Kubik, welcome to the Committee.
STATEMENT OF FRANK KUBIK, MANAGER, COMMODITY SUPPLEMENTAL FOOD
PROGRAM, FOCUS: HOPE, DETROIT, MICHIGAN
Mr. Kubik. Mr. Chairman and members of the Committee, thank
you for the opportunity to present testimony today. I work with
the Commodity Supplemental Food Program. We provide food to
41,000 monthly Detroit metropolitan area residents, and CSFP
serves nearly 500,000 monthly participants in 32 States, the
District of Columbia, and two Indian Tribal Organizations.
Today, 91 percent of CSFP participants are seniors who face
an increasingly difficult time making their limited resources
stretch to take care of all their daily needs, particularly
their food needs. The average income for a senior in our
program is under $600 a month. At Focus: HOPE, we work with
over 300 volunteer agencies and thousands of volunteers to
distribute the commodities to individuals who are unable to
visit our sites, and these are their stories.
Leonard and Theresa are both in their 80's. Leonard worked
in a small machine shop for 38 years. Unfortunately, his
pension was discontinued because his former employer went out
of business. Now Leonard and his wife are living off their
monthly Social Security check of $822. Because of health
problems, neither can drive a car. Leonard told me that he is
unable to fill out the registration forms for public assistance
because his vision is not that good, and the meager amount of
assistance they would receive is not worth the cost of paying
someone to drive them to the office and then paying someone
else to take them shopping. There are only small corner stores,
liquor stores, and gas stations that sell some food products
within walking distance of Leonard's house, providing few
choices given the money that Leonard and his wife have for food
each month. Leonard depends on the kindness of neighbors to
take him on some errands without charge and the food supplement
that they receive each month from Focus: HOPE. Leonard and his
wife do not have much, and they do not ask for much. His eyes
tear up when he talks about the circumstances that he and his
wife endure. Leonard worked all his life and did everything the
right way. How did things go so wrong?
Mike toured Focus: HOPE as part of a Ford management
employee group who carried out a one-time community service
delivery to homebound seniors. Mike delivered food to Mary Ann,
a woman in her 70's. After spending a few minutes with Mary
Ann, he found out something shocking. He discovered that she
was hungry. Four hundred and fifty dollars a month does not
cover much. Moreover, Mary Ann is afraid to leave her house
because of crime in her neighborhood. Her husband died years
ago and she is alone.
A native of England, Mike was shaken by what he had just
seen and certainly did not expect to find it here in America.
Mike made a promise to himself that as long as he was on
assignment in this region, he would take Mary Ann her monthly
CSFP food box, add to it what he could, and he would bring his
wife to spend time with her. I often wonder what will happen to
Mary Ann when Mike gets reassigned elsewhere.
University of Michigan graduate students run a volunteer
community service assignment at Focus: HOPE. They were
delivering food packages to a five-story apartment building
with a non-working elevator. When they arrived at Mrs. Jones'
apartment, everyone immediately noticed the smell of gas. The
gas burners on the stove were turned on high with the window
open a bit. Mrs. Jones used the stove for heat because the
landlord would not allow the heat to be turned on until
November 1st. This happened to be the last week of October, so
Mrs. Jones kept the stove on and the window open slightly so
that the gas fumes did not make her sick, or worse.
Mrs. Jones lived with her husband for 28 years before he
died. They had children who rarely came by. Mrs. Jones had
worked low-paying, under-the-table jobs. The only Social
Security benefits that she was receiving were based on their
modest income. Mrs. Jones could not confront the landlord about
the heat because he evicted anyone who disagreed with him. She
did not move somewhere else because she could not afford
anything better. She considered her neighbors in the building
to be her family, and she did not want to leave them. She was
not receiving any additional assistance because she had no way
of getting to one of the offices to apply for help. Public
transportation in Detroit is woefully inadequate and needs much
improvement.
When the students returned to their campus, they started
making phone calls and things began to happen. A day or so
later, but still in October, the heat in that apartment
building got turned on. The elevator was miraculously fixed.
Those students spent a day out of their lives to deliver food
to seniors. What would have happened if they had not gone? And
what happens to others in Mrs. Jones' situation?
The conditions are all too typical for many seniors in this
country. The lack of access to high-quality food, public
transportation, inadequate affordable medical care, and too
often unsafe neighborhoods collude to tarnish the golden years.
This is unconscionable for the most prosperous Nation in the
world. People who have worked all of their lives and have
contributed so much to this Nation are being neglected and left
on their own at a time when they could most use a helping hand.
While we are doing much, there is still much left to be done.
We deeply appreciate the Committee's continued support of
vital programs such as CSFP, which provide a critical lifeline
to so many who are not here to thank you today.
On behalf of the Nation's Commodity Supplemental Food
Program participants and volunteers nationwide, I thank you for
your continued support and this opportunity to present
testimony today.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Kubik can be found on page
88 in the appendix.]
Chairman Harkin. Mr. Kubik, thank you very much for your
testimony, and thank you all again, for putting a human face on
the challenges we are confronted with here.
I will start at the end. Mr. Kubik, again, with regard to
the elderly, we have heard testimony and seen data indicating
that less than a third of seniors eligible for food stamps
actually receive food stamps. Do you have suggestions as to how
we might take steps to increase seniors' participation in the
Food Stamp Program?
Mr. Kubik. As many have said before me today, the
enrollment process is very complicated for many seniors. In
Michigan, there is a group called My Caf that is trying to
bring food stamp registration closer to seniors, as opposed to
the State offices they would have to travel to. They are
setting up operations in apartment buildings and areas where
seniors congregate, and they have an enrollment process that
makes it easier for seniors to access them.
The problem is, as they have approached me to work with my
agency, I wanted to learn more about what they were doing, so I
asked to sit through a process, a normal enrollment process so
I would have an idea of what I am going to try to sell to folks
who visit our sites. With the prepared staff member, with the
prepared volunteer who had every answer to every question in
front of them so that there was no delay in terms of what was
the question, what exactly do I need, it still took about 45
minutes for that one person to complete the process. And the
questions that I was hearing, they were pretty difficult for
me, and I am sure that a lot of seniors who may not have a
clear understanding of the process are going to be very
confused. They may not have the proper information and
documentation. They may not know what type of information they
should be keeping. They might not have a detailed spending
record. So the process itself has to be streamlined and become
more accessible.
The problem that springs from that also is how do we reach
seniors who are homebound or have issues like we have in
Detroit and in many major cities, and I am sure in urban and
rural areas all over the country, of access to the sites and
access to shopping--and competitive shopping and not the corner
stores, gas stations, and liquor stores that offer the limited
supply of food at high prices. That is a major issue in
Detroit. And I know that providing someone with the Bridge
card, as we call it in Michigan, the electronic benefit card,
in lieu of a food stamp per se, if you do not have a place to
take it or a place you can get good value for what may be a
small amount of benefits, it is not worth it for the senior to
enroll in the program. We have got to look at that benefit----
Chairman Harkin. How much coordination is there among
churches and other public service agencies in Detroit? If and
individual in need of assistance is identified at one agency is
there coordination between agencies to ensure that individual
is enrolled in other assistance programs, such as food stamps?
I am still bothered by what was said earlier about, the need to
go one place for one thing, and somewhere else for another
thing, and public transportation does not work well. I have
heard so many stories. You wait for a bus. You finally get down
there. You walk someplace, you get there, and you find out you
did not bring all the necessary documents you needed or
something like that. Well, then you have got to go back and
come back again. It is very hard for people to do that.
So I worry about the coordination. Again, I have heard
stories in the past where someone had been visited by, say, a
health agency and maybe they were in a community health center,
and they were getting their medical attention through a
community health center. But they also needed food, but no one
seemed to be coordinating with them to get that information.
How much coordination do you feel there is among all these
various entities?
Mr. Kubik. Not as much as there needs to be. As providers
of the USDA program, we have to have food stamp information
available to our participants when they come in. There is a
varied amount of posters and handouts and brochures that make
the program--that we can provide to our participants. The
problem is in a city like Detroit that is so--transportation
and communication among seniors is so difficult. We have a hard
time even getting our program to the seniors who need it. We
have to work with 150 agencies in Detroit itself to give food
out. When I mentioned the 300, we cover four counties, and I
always assumed the bulk of those 300 were in the other
counties, not in Detroit. Well, half of those agencies are in
Detroit, which means the issue of transportation, the issue of
access is just a larger issue than we all imagined.
I think another issue is just the message of what are food
stamps, what do you qualify for, are you eligible. Many seniors
do not believe they are eligible. In a city like Detroit, they
have such a varied background of diversity and many languages
spoken, the information is sometimes hard to translate. I know
there is information available in varied languages because we
get it off the USDA website. But it still is going to be an
issue of getting that message across.
There is a reluctance among some folks from immigrant
backgrounds to apply for the program because they are afraid of
giving up their personal information. They are afraid of what
that may do.
We have got to dispel all those myths and all those
misconceptions about the program, strengthen it to seniors, and
make seniors know that it is there for them. It is a
supplemental program, like CSFP. These programs work hand in
hand together. But if they do not know about it, they do not
know if they qualify or they think they are taking benefits
from someone else. It is just a hard sell. And, quite honestly,
many seniors see it as welfare and do not want to participate
in it.
Chairman Harkin. We must examine and work to improve
coordination between agencies. It just spills over into so many
different jurisdictions that are beyond this committee, too.
Regarding the Food Distribution Program on Indian
Reservations, you have talked about how a recipient may get
food from a truck approximately once a month when it comes to
the Indian reservation, and, therefore, to get fresh fruits and
vegetables is pretty tough.
Ms. Newport. Yes, sir.
Chairman Harkin. Is this widespread? Is this a widespread
problem, or is this just in certain areas?
Ms. Newport. I would say that the problem is widespread,
especially in the large land-based tribes where there is
actually only perhaps a 4-hour window of opportunity per month
for people in that community to come and pick up their food.
They travel a long distance, and they have a very short
opportunity to be sure they are there at the right time and the
right place. And so it is of a great deal of concern. Certainly
that is not the case everywhere, but it happens way too often,
yes, sir.
Chairman Harkin. Are you able to estimate how many of the
programs have the capacity to regularly receive and stock fresh
fruit and frozen produce?
Ms. Newport. I believe that we have finally reached the
point, after 5 or so years, that almost every program in the
country is tapping into the fresh produce if they have the
coolers to handle the produce properly. And I think there is
some final installation going on in a very large tribe in the
Southwest to accommodate frozen meats, and they are just now
receiving those, while some of us have had those for years,
just because of equipment and infrastructure challenges. But
taking those out on the road is a different challenge than
having them in your main warehouse.
Chairman Harkin. Are you providing any kind of nutrition
information at your sites?
Ms. Newport. Absolutely. We have a very coordinated effort
at Chickasaw Nation. I mentioned that I administer many FNS
programs, and we do deliver those services in nutrition centers
and are able to coordinate our WIC nutrition education and Food
Distribution Program, a lot of the farmers market activity, all
of those sorts of things our participants in any program are
the beneficiary of.
Unfortunately, the Food Distribution Program does not have
any specific nutrition education money and needs to be able to
tap into that food stamp/nutrition education money just like
the State does through their Food Stamp Program.
Chairman Harkin. Ms. Francis, again, we were both somewhat
pleased, I think, as a Committee and those of us that serve on
it, with the rapidity with which the Department of Agriculture,
the Food Service people, got food stamps and got food out after
Hurricane Katrina. Generally speaking, I think it was pretty
good. Obviously, there were gaps, but I have heard that it
worked pretty well.
Ms. Francis. It did.
Chairman Harkin. But I am just wondering, again, it seemed
to me that initially we heard that emergency relief was going
well and it remained okay for a certain period of time, and
then what happened, that was OK for a certain period of time.
Ms. Francis. It was.
Chairman Harkin. And then it sort of fell off after that.
Ms. Francis. Yes, sir.
Chairman Harkin. Can you tell me a little bit more about
that and what recommendations you might have for any changes to
deal with emergencies--well, I hope we do not have another
emergency of that nature, but we will have emergencies. What
can we do to kind of get over that where when you come in, you
have got a big bubble right afterward and then it sort of falls
off after that?
Ms. Francis. I think one of the things that we can do is
there needs to be more outreach so that folks transition from
the Disaster Program to the regular Food Stamp Program. There
was a lot of confusion in the beginning once we were eligible
for the Disaster Food Stamp Program. There was a point we were
only told it was going to be for a month. Then they said, OK,
we can extend it for another month. And then some of us were
under the impression that we needed to spend the money before
the end of the third month; otherwise, we were going to lose
it. So there was that.
So there needs to be some more consistent messaging and
outreach to and educating families about what the process is
and how they are going to transition. For some of us, it was
the first time we were using the program, so we did not
understand clearly. All we knew was that we had something that
we could get food for families.
The relaxed rules, verification requirements for us after 3
months would have helped some more because the devastation that
we had, our infrastructure was not there to support replacing
the documents that we lost, to prove residency, to get bank
statements, to get leases. Things like that are difficult for
families to provide that, and you also have to remember that,
again, the food stamp offices themselves, they were devastated,
too. And so on their end, they did not have the resources as
well to handle the overwhelming need.
An organization like ours can step in and meet some of
that, you know, because we are out there working with families
and helping to alleviate some of that. But for us it would have
made a difference if the time had been extended and if there
were more consistent, clear messages about how we go from one
to the other and what actually our benefits were and how long
we had them for.
Chairman Harkin. Thank you, Just one last thing. Mr.
Bolling, in visiting some of the food banks, food pantries in
Iowa over the last few years, again, I have heard what you have
just testified to, and that is that some of the donations have
gone down, food prices have gone up obviously in the last
couple, 3 years, but the demand has also gone up. And I could
not figure that out. I tried to think. More and more people are
working, but at the same time more and more people are going to
food pantries. The more I delved into it, what became, I think,
somewhat clear is that the food stamp benefits were running
out, and that is when they would go to the food pantries. And
it just seemed to me like the food stamp benefits were not
keeping up.
So I am just curious as to your experience in that area in
the last--oh, I don't know if I would have a delineation of the
timeline; the last few years, let me just put it that way--of
more and more people who get food stamps coming in to get food
from your food bank.
Mr. Bolling. Well, I have got 30 years to draw from, but if
we would look in the last few years, I think what we see--and
we have never really named this--we are seeing emergency
programs become supplemental feeding programs, programs that
were never meant to function in that way, it used to be a rule
we would feed you three times in a year in a certain emergency.
The same folks are coming back in month and month out.
So my point of those community-based organizations, 50,000
strong, are the point of entry. I think this is where we can
really gain ground in doing nutritional counseling and helping
people fill out their food stamp forms, EITC forms. We are
leaving money on the table. We are leaving food on the table.
And I think these are organizations that the Federal Government
does not have to pay, who are motivated, usually from religious
persuasion, to work in partnership with the food stamp offices.
I cannot say enough about how important commodities are
here. I with The Atlanta Community Food Bank has the contract
for all eight food banks in Georgia, and that is the way it
works in a lot of States. I have got to do the same work no
matter how many commodities you send me. I have got to set up
the systems, set aside the warehouse space, contract with the
truckers. In our food bank, commodities are down 50 percent. I
think they are down 40 percent across the board.
Chairman Harkin. From what point in time, down from----
Mr. Bolling. Well, that is in the last year.
Chairman Harkin. Oh, just in the last year.
Mr. Bolling. In the last year. So those commodities, as we
talk about how important nutrition is, are the nutritious food.
They are the best food. And they are the food that we can get
directly to families through community-based organizations. We
have an outlet to do that.
So this is where I think we get the leverage, and I think
as food banks and our community-based partner agencies become
more sophisticated, they can be the point of entry for people
to--if the library is not open, go to your local church. There
is a computer there and counselors who have been trained.
Again, in Atlanta--and I think this is throughout the
country--we have a relationship with Georgia State Public
Health School, with Emory, Rollins School of Public Health. We
have nutritionists and interns that work with us, and they are
very motivated to do internships at the community level. Again,
not anybody that the Federal or State government has to pay to
do this, but working in partnership using the commodities that
you can make available, it multiplies, leverages many times
over.
Chairman Harkin. Well, I look forward to visiting your
place and getting more information. I think you can be very
helpful in our deliberations this year on what we need to do.
Mr. Bolling. Well, certainly call on me, and we look
forward to hosting a field hearing at the Atlanta Food Bank.
Chairman Harkin. Mr. Bolling, thank you.
Senator Chambliss?
Senator Chambliss. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Following on what you said there, Ms. Francis, with respect
to educating folks about this program and, Bill, knowing that
you have said that one-third of the people you serve are on
food stamps, but two-thirds are eligible. I assume that others
have similar experiences. What are you hearing from the folks
out there in the field who are eligible that is the biggest
impediment to applying for food stamps?
Ms. Francis. For us, the biggest impediment is the time
that it takes. Our application is 16 pages long, and the
documents that they need to provide for that, and then some
folks are hesitant to share any savings that they may have
because they know it will count against them in receiving. And
so the time that it takes to complete the application, the way
that they are treated when they go to the food stamp office,
and the hesitancy to share all that personal information to
receive food benefits stops many families from doing it, from
participating.
A program like ours, where they do not have to go to the
food stamp office to receive it and somebody is actually there
helping them complete the application and spending the time to
help them get the documents together, and we are not just
providing access to the Food Stamp Program, but in more--90
percent of the times providing access for other programs that
require the same documentation helps some families get in.
Mr. Bolling. I would certainly echo that. It is time,
complexity, access. Again, I think this is a place where we can
use the private sector to help facilitate people getting
access.
Senator Chambliss. Anybody else have a comment?
[No response.]
Senator Chambliss. OK. The issue of nutrition continues to
be of concern to me. Bill, for example, in your operation at
your level in your distribution system, do you get into the
nutrition issue to make sure that a family that receives the
benefits of your facility has the right kind of balance? Is
that an achievable goal from your perspective?
Mr. Bolling. Well, I certainly think it is achievable. I
think there is a lot more work to do in this area. Again, I
would emphasize the role of commodities here because it
balances out. Food banks depend on donations from the food
industry, and it is fresh food, it is frozen, it is canned
food, it is food drives, all the ways that we get it. We will
handle over 25 million pounds out of my food bank. But there
are times when we do not have the nutrition we need and we need
to rely on commodities.
This is a place where we need to use those folks who really
care about nutrition--the nutritionists, the public health
nurses and doctors and so forth--and we can work in partnership
with them. What we have got to do is push it down to community-
based organizations. We are doing that. As you saw, we were
doing it at the Atlanta Food Bank, and I think increasingly if
we can offer the incentives and have the placement for interns
and nutritionists to work directly with these community-based
organizations, we can make great progress in this area.
Senator Chambliss. So, again, it is a matter of educating
the folks out there, not only to participate in the system but
how to participate in the system.
Mr. Bolling. Well, I think it is not only education, but as
in the testimony in the panel before, if you have limited
income and popcorn costs $1 and fresh fruit costs $4, and you
need to fill up that evening, you buy the popcorn. You may know
that is not nutritional, but you need to fill up. So I think it
is a combination of both education and access
We are, for instance, working both with immigrant
communities and with families with limited incomes to show them
how not buying prepared food would save them money, that you
can put--not even using meat, but with beans and rice, you can
make complete protein. So there are ways of stretching the food
dollar, and it is a matter of education. And I think you know
that does not happen in the welfare office. That happens at
your local church or mosque or synagogue where people feel
comfortable, they can stay there as long as they like; there
are counselors there that they learn to trust. And over time,
even as we do at the food bank, we prepare some of those meals,
you know, and send them out, and over time people make progress
in this area.
Senator Chambliss. Ms. Francis, was there food generally
available after Rita and Katrina?
Ms. Francis. In the months after? Yes.
Senator Chambliss. No, I mean immediately after. In other
words was there a system in place that was able to deliver food
to folks who needed it?
Ms. Francis. No, sir, there was not, but we did have maybe
then, 2 to 3 weeks, folks like my colleague to the left who
would actually get commodities and food stores, and that is
what we had afterwards until the Disaster Food Stamp Program
got up and running.
Senator Chambliss. OK. So it was primarily a private sector
operation that delivered the food.
Ms. Francis. Yes, sir.
Senator Chambliss. Bill, by chance, did you send food down
there?
Mr. Bolling. We not only sent food, but we also received
150,000 people from the Gulf Coast, into Atlanta. We were
second to Houston. So we did both.
It is interesting. It is not only food, but it is paper
supplies, it is cleaning supplies. It is all the things that
you need to get back up on your feet.
This is another area, I think, where community-based food
banks and the aid organizations know their community. You have
always got to triage in with the Red Cross and the Federal
Government, but after that first week or so, you need to work
with folks who know their community. When people come in and
say, ``I live here,'' if you go to your local church, they will
know if you live in that neighborhood or not.
So that is where we really rely on community-based
organizations to make that connection and do a better job.
Senator Chambliss. I guess from a pure food stamp
distribution standpoint, we do not do a very good job of that,
probably do not do anything at all relative to incorporating
other agencies, Mr. Chairman, within our DFACS or whatever the
distribution point may be, to provide other services. If you
need health care, you go to the Health Department. If you need
food, you got to the Department of Family and Children's
Services. And what you are saying makes sense. If you have got
all of these agencies working together, you can do a much
better job. I don't know how we would do that in the farm bill,
but----
[Laughter.]
Mr. Bolling. I would say there is a very interesting
project in northern Illinois now where we are using community-
based organizations actually to fill, e-mail them in, and
expedite the services. We can do that anywhere in the country.
Senator Chambliss. Do the private agencies that you work
with do any counseling of potential food stamp recipients?
Mr. Bolling. Many, many of them do. Many of them are not
that sophisticated. You know, it really is up to them how they
want to run their ministry. But, increasingly, the food banks
are able to offer incentives to do that kind of counseling. We
will give you a discount on food. We will come out and do the
training. And we are doing much more of that around the
country.
I really think that is the best connection for folks, in
their local community, in their neighborhood, with people they
trust. And the more we can be in partnership with our food
stamp office and our welfare office, the more we are able to
use the technology that is now available, the more we learn to
trust each other and the more we leverage our resources.
Senator Chambliss. Again, just to the panel, Tom and I were
both part of the welfare reform package that we passed back in
1996, and our idea obviously was to incentivize people to get
off of welfare and onto payrolls. At the same time, we tried to
have the compassion that would allow these folks to participate
in programs like food stamps.
Generally have you seen that accomplished? We have seen
numbers about folks coming off welfare rolls, but obviously a
lot of this is due to folks not wanting to fill out the
paperwork for food stamps, as you have alluded to. But,
overall, are you seeing the incentives work to get people off
food stamps, off welfare, and back into the mainstream
community and back on payrolls?
Mr. Kubik. One of the things we have seen, our organization
offers job training in addition to food. We want to get some of
the young people who are in the program--even though our
numbers are a majority senior citizen, we want to get some of
the young people self-sufficient. We offer degrees in
engineering and other skills there so that the young moms can
get off our program, get off food stamps, and get a job.
So we have seen some impact that way, but, again, it is a
small impact on a larger problem; especially our unemployment
rate in Detroit is very high. So we have seen some movement
that way, and yet we see--the people that we are dealing with
are those who are not likely to get another job, the seniors,
who are not going to enter the workforce. That is what we see
in our program. I cannot speak for the others, but our program
is seeing more and more seniors. We have seen our demographics
go from, in 1990, where we were 90 percent moms and kids and 10
percent seniors, to 2007 now where we are 91 percent seniors
and 9 percent moms and kids.
So we do what we can on the local level with what we do at
Focus: HOPE with job training, but nationwide, my counterparts
and CSFP in States across the country will say they are seeing
more and more seniors who are not likely to benefit from that.
We mentioned some of the seniors in my examples that have
families and children who do not support them and who have
distanced themselves from their families. So maybe a child is
doing better now, but that does not impact the senior. And so
we have actually seen an increased need among seniors at a time
when we have seen less moms and kids come in.
Senator Chambliss. OK. Well, thank you all very much for
some very insightful testimony, and we appreciate very much you
taking the time to be here today.
Chairman Harkin. Thank you, Senator Chambliss. Thank you
all.
Let's see. Just a couple of things here. For those of you
who are here, and staff, we have talked about how we get people
who are food stamp recipients getting more fresh fruits and
vegetables. We know what is happening. We know that, you know,
things that are fat-laden or starch-laden fill you up. And we
also know those are the cheapest, and fresh fruits and
vegetables are the highest priced. So when you are trying to
figure out how much you can spend, obviously you gravitate
toward those things that fill you up and that are cheapest.
But if we want people to buy more nutritious foods, then I
think we have got to figure out some way maybe, Saxby, of
having some added benefit, if you go with your EBT card and you
go into a store and you buy food, if you buy fresh fruits and
vegetables, that somehow when that is added you get some kind
of added benefit to your food stamps.
Mr. Kubik. Good idea.
Ms. Newport. An incentive.
Chairman Harkin. So help us figure out how you do that. I
am not certain how you do it, but some way we have got to
figure that out and get some added benefit in to do that. So I
am looking for ideas and suggestions on how that might be done.
I have a statement here from Senator Ben Nelson that I want
to include in the record at the beginning of our hearing.
[The prepared statement of Hon. E. Benjamin Nelson can be
found on page 46 in the appendix.]
Chairman Harkin. Also, we have to try to get a quorum at
some time to get our business resolution through, and we will
do that off the floor of the Senate at some time, maybe during
a vote.
With that, I thank you all for being here, and the
Committee will stand adjourned subject to the call of the
Chair, I guess.
[Whereupon, at 12 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.]
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A P P E N D I X
January 31, 2007
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DOCUMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD
January 31, 2007
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QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
January 31, 2007
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