This December, Congress has some important decisions to make — decisions that will have a significant impact on the number of people experiencing poverty in the United States. If Congress does nothing, Unemployment Insurance and payroll tax cuts will expire at the end of the month.

It is rare that Congress is faced with a decision that would almost immediately save a large number of Americans from needlessly experiencing poverty. Analysis from the venerable Center on Budget and Policy Priorities shows that extending the payroll tax cut will help keep 1.1 million Americans — low-income workers and their families — out of poverty.

Congress also has a chance to help people who are currently unemployed from falling into poverty.  Last year at this time, Congress and President Obama extended Unemployment Insurance for 12 months, a move that kept more than 3 million Americans out of poverty.   The extension of Unemployment Insurance that was passed last December will expire at the end of this month.   If Unemployment Insurance is not extended, many struggling unemployed people may lose their Unemployment benefits before finding new jobs.  Unemployment rates are still high and many unemployed people have been searching for work for a very long time. In fact, research from the Pew Economic Policy Group shows that more than half of the long-term unemployed have been looking for employment for more than 12 months.

Not only do Unemployment Insurance and the Payroll Tax cut help to keep struggling people out of poverty, they also provide a much-needed stimulus to our economy.

Your Congressional representatives should hear from you on this important issue.  Our friends at Network: A National Catholic Social Justice Lobby have an easy-to-use form that allows you to send a message to your representatives.

Regular readers of our blog know that St. Anthony’s JEVA (Justice Education, Volunteer, and Advocacy) program has been working to promote policies that simplify the process for receiving food assistance at the same time that we have worked to promote fair local and state budget practices that don’t deepen poverty and hunger in our community.

Given our history of advocacy on these topics, it was exciting to see two stories in this week’s San Francisco Bay Guardian about hunger and food security.

One of the stories is about a topic we know well: California’s low participation rate in the SNAP program (SNAP is the federal program that used to be known as “Food Stamps” and is called “CalFresh” here in California). St. Anthony’s is proud to have been involved in the advocacy efforts that have resulted (finally!) in the lifting of some of the barriers that California had put in place with the passage of AB 6 this October. The policy changes contained in AB 6 (removal of the finger imaging requirement for CalFresh applicants and implementing 6-month instead of quarterly reporting for CalFresh recipients) have been a staple of St. Anthony’s anti-hunger advocacy work for many years.

The other story also concerns a topic that St. Anthony’s knows well: the “food divide” in San Francisco that results in hunger and poor nutrition among low-income people, people living neighborhoods without access to healthy food, and seniors living on fixed incomes. I am quoted in the article explaining about how lack of health care, food, and stable housing work together to promote negative health outcomes like malnutrition and obesity. I also discuss budget cuts at the state level that have reduced the income of seniors and people with disabilities who receive SSI (Supplemental Security Income) by $77 per month as compared to the benefit levels of three years ago. Currently, SSI recipients are forced to try to make ends meet at a sub-poverty income level. And, because SSI recipients are ineligible for CalFresh benefits in the state of California, they face an even greater risk for hunger and the negative health consequences associated with it.

The Congressional Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction (commonly known as the “Super Committee”) has only one week left to develop its deficit reduction plan. Anti-hunger advocates from across the country are calling on our Congressional representatives to tell the Super Committee that deficit reduction should not be achieved by increasing hunger and malnutrition by cutting funding for nutrition safety net programs like SNAP (food stamps), the Emergency Food Assistance Program, WIC, the Commodity Supplemental Food Program, or child nutrition programs.

Our friends at Feeding America have made it easy to get in touch with our Congressional representatives to ask them to tell the Super Committee not to reduce the deficit by increasing hunger.

Here’s what you can do — take five minutes and call today (and don’t forget to share this post with a friend!)

1. Dial the toll-free number—1-877-698-8228

2. When prompted, enter your zip code.

3. Listen to the brief instructions, and you will be patched through to your Senator’s office automatically.

4.Once you’ve been connected to the first office, deliver this message:

“Please weigh in with the Super Committee personally and urge them to reject any proposals that would cut anti-hunger programs like SNAP, TEFAP, CSFP, or WIC or other child nutrition programs during the deficit reduction process. We cannot afford to increase hunger in America.”

After the call, stay on the line. You will be automatically connected to your remaining legislators’ offices.

As regular blog readers may recall, St. Anthony’s has been tracking the actions of the Congressional “super committee” that is charged with creating a plan to identify $1.2 trillion in deficit reduction strategies.

The deadline for the Super Committee to develop their plan is only weeks away (they must complete their plan by November 23). Some of the ideas that are being considered by the Super Committee include cutting vital nutrition assistance programs like:

• SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which is California is known as “CalFresh” — the new name for the Food Stamp program),
• WIC (the Women, Infants and Children program, which provides healthy food to pregnant and nursing moms and their young children)
• TEFAP (The Emergency Food Assistance Program, which provides fresh produce and other staples to food banks, which are distributed to community-based food providers like St. Anthony’s)
• CSFP (the Commodity Supplemental Food Program, which provides commodity foods to low-income seniors)

Today, I participated in a conference call with Massachusetts Representative Jim McGovern, an anti-hunger champion who urged those of us who are concerned about the fate of the federal nutrition safety net to reach out to our congressional representatives over the next three weeks to tell them about our priorities.

Our friends at Feeding America have made it easy to reach out to our legislators and inform them about our priorities.  To send an email to your representatives, click here and follow the prompts.

Back in June, St. Anthony’s partnered with anti-hunger organizations and advocacy groups from across California to help educate people about the SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) Restaurant Meals Program. The Restaurant Meals Program is part of the the CalFresh program (the new name for California’s food stamp program) and it allows CalFresh recipients who live in a place without a cooking facility (a Single Room Occupancy hotel room, for example), or who are homeless, elderly, or disabled to use their CalFresh benefits at a restaurant.

We talked to our Dining Room guests about their use of the program and its importance in helping them obtain healthy meals. Some of their stories were recounted here. After hearing the stories of our Dining Room guests, we realized how important both the Restaurant Meals program and our Dining Room are to low income people who can’t afford food and who don’t have the ability to cook their own food at home.

We are proud to have helped with the making of this video, which does a great job of telling the stories of some of the Californians who benefit from Restaurant Meals. Please check out the video and the SNAP Restaurant Meals website to learn more about this important program.

Check out our Hunger Action Day photo album on our Facebook Page to see photos of the advocates that helped pass this legislation.

Here’s some more information about the legislation that was passed:

AB 6 (Fuentes) simplifies and improves the CalFresh (food stamp) program by moving CalFresh recipients from quarterly to six-month reporting, removing the finger imaging requirement from CalFresh applications, and implementing a “heat and eat” initiative, which will simplify and expand the use of the standard utility allowance. AB 6 will change CalFresh to make it easier for eligible recipients to apply for benefits, easier for them to maintain the benefits they’re eligible for, and easier for them to claim the standard utility allowance, which results in higher benefits. This is great news for California, which is consistently ranked among the worst states in the country in terms of the number of eligible CalFresh applicants that we have enrolled in the program. Currently, about 2 million people state-wide are eligible for CalFresh and aren’t receiving benefits. AB 6 will help California to solve this problem.

AB 69 (Beall) establishes a program that will allow California counties to automatically enroll eligible seniors in the CalFresh program by using Social Service Administration information. Statewide, only 5% of seniors who are eligible for CalFresh are actually enrolled in the program.

AB 152 (Fuentes) establishes a state-level Emergency Food Assistance Program and establishes tax incentives for California growers who donate fresh produce to California food banks.

The latest poverty numbers were released by the US Census Bureau this week, and they don’t look good. Comparing 2007 (the year the recession began) to 2010, we see that poverty in San Francisco has increased from 10.4% in to 12.5%. Poverty among San Franciscans aged 65 and over has increased from 10.5% in 2007 to 14.6% in 2010.  Unemployment in San Francisco has risen from 4.8% in 2007 to 9.0% in 2010.

For us at St. Anthony’s, these numbers reflect what we’ve been seeing across our programs (dining room, free medical clinic, tenderloin tech lab, social work center, free clothing program) since the beginning of the recession.  Because we have seen an increase in poverty, hunger, and homelessness among the people we serve, we are very concerned about the deliberations of the Congressional “Super Committee”, who are currently meeting to figure out a plan to reduce the deficit by $1.2 trillion over the next ten years.

Congress needs to hear that It is important that we achieve deficit reduction without sacrificing jobs,  deepening poverty, and increasing homelessness and hunger. Congress needs to hear from us now.

Our friends at the Coalition on Human Needs have an easy online form that you can use to email your congressional representatives and let them know about your priorities.  Click here to use their form. You’ll be asked to enter your zip code first so that your message can be sent to the correct Congressional Representatives.

Pictured: Two St. Anthony's advocates at the Capitol in Sacramento.

In June, advocates from St. Anthony’s traveled to Sacramento to testify on behalf of AB 828 (Swanson). AB 828, also known as the Nutritional Assistance for Families Act, would lift the lifetime ban on CalFresh (the new name for California’s “food stamp” program) assistance for people with prior drug felony convictions.

California is one of a handful of states that has opted in to the federal ban on food stamp benefits for people with drug related felony convictions that have occurred after 1996.  Drug related felonies are the only type of felony convictions that disqualify a person from receiving CalFresh benefits.

Tomorrow, August 17, we will travel to Sacramento again to meet with state Senators to talk to them about the importance of AB 828.   Advocates who are participants in St. Anthony’s drug and alcohol rehab program, the Father Alfred Center are coming to Sacramento to tell legislators that we believe that CalFresh benefits are critical for successful community re-entry and economic self-sufficiency. Denied these benefits, individuals who have already paid their debt to society are unable to secure nutritious food for their families.

Want to join us?  You don’t have to trek to Sacramento to make your voice heard!  Click here to sign an online petition in support of AB 828.  We currently have 611 signatures.  We’d love to be able to get up to 828!  Please sign the petition and share it with your friends.

So-called “entitlement” programs like Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, Supplemental Security Income, Unemployment Insurance, Veterans Compensation, TANF (welfare), and SNAP (food stamps) are exempt from cuts under the spending cap, however, they’re fair game for cuts under the new twelve-member “Congressional Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction” (commonly referred to as the “supercommittee”). The supercommittee may also suggest tax reform measures as a deficit reduction strategy.

If the supercommittee doesn’t come up with a plan that achieves an additional $1.2 trillion in deficit solutions, or if the committee’s plan is rejected by Congress or the President, automatic trigger cuts of an additional $1.2 trillion to discretionary spending will go into effect in January 2013, with cuts spread evenly between defense and non-defense programs.

At the local and state levels, we’ve already seen drastic cuts to health and social service programs since the recession began.  San Francisco has lost homeless shelter beds, drop-in centers, and substance abuse treatment and mental health programs.  California has reduced SSI grants by $77/month, has eliminated dental care and Adult Day Health Care as Medi-Cal benefits, has instituted co-pays for Medi-Cal services, and has reduced CalWORKs grants for low-income families.

As House minority leader, our Congressional representative, Nancy Pelosi, will choose three members of the 12-member supercommittee.  She has made a public statement that her supercommittee appointees will protect funding for entitlement programs like Medicaid and Social Security.

What principles do you believe should guide the “supercommittee” as they try to come up with a $1.2 trillion debt relief package?  Should programs that help low-income Americans be held harmless?  Should tax reform be part of the budget-balancing package?  How would you be affected by potential cuts to any of the programs listed above? Please leave a comment to this post and let us know what you think. We will be contacting Representative Pelosi to share our views about the deficit reduction plan with her, and we will forward your comments on to her.

To send a message to your legislators, visit one of the following websites:

• NETWORK: A Catholic Social Justice Lobby
• Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism
• Coalition on Human Needs

In California, Adult Day Health provides health care, nutritious meals, physical and speech therapy, and socialization for 34,000 frail seniors and people with disabilities as a Medi-Cal benefit.  Medi-Cal is California’s Medicaid program, a public health insurance program for low-income Californians.

In March of 2011, the budget agreement that was passed by the legislature and signed by the Governor eliminated Adult Day Health services as a Medi-Cal benefit.  This cut is set to take effect on October 1, 2011.

The legislature and Governor have allocated $85 million (half of the yearly cost to run the Adult Day Health Care program) to transition existing recipients into other services.   It is not clear how many of the over 300 centers, 7,000 employees and 34,000 recipients will be able to continue in a new model of Adult Day Health Care with State general funding cut by 50%.  California currently does not have a plan in place for how Adult Day Health Care recipients would be transitioned to receive other services.  Eleven of the 300 Adult Day Health Care centers in the state (including one in San Francisco) have closed as of today.

That is why advocates are asking the Governor to sign AB 96 , authored by Assemblymember Bob Blumenfield (D, Woodland Hills), a bill that would direct the CA Department of Health Care Services to develop and implement a new model of Adult Day Health Care.  AB 96 would:

• Direct the State Department of Health Care Services, on or before September 1, 2011, to submit an application to the federal government to implement the Keeping Adults Free from Institutions (KAFI) program.  KAFI will provide services for recipients of adult day health care who are at the greatest risk of institutionalization.
• Establish that the KAFI program shall utilize licensed adult day health centers to provide services for Medi-Cal beneficiaries who have been assessed to be at significant risk of institutionalization.

AB 96 is on Governor Brown’s desk, and he has until July 26, 2011 to veto or sign the bill.  The California Association for Adult Day Services is asking people around the state to contact the Governor and ask him to sign AB 96.  They suggest using the following language:

“Please sign AB 96 to preserve services at existing Adult Day Health centers and avoid harm that would come from any gaps in patient care.”

Click here for Governor Brown’s contact information.

If you’d like more information about this issue, check out this story from California Healthline.