Guest Blog on the 2011 Hunger Conference!

Fran Alloway, R.D., a nutrition and health educator from the Penn State Cooperative Extension of Delaware County, is the head organizer for the Annual Delaware County Hunger Conference. Today she shares with us a guest blog on this year's conference!

On March 1, 2011, The Challenge of Feeding our Diverse Communities in Delaware County was held at Widener University. For the third year, a group of agency staff and individuals organized a conference to give those working with low income clients the tools to address many of the issues faced by those seeking food, food stamps and related services. Our speakers addressed the self sufficiency standard, health literacy, food related health issues faced across the lifespan, ethnic barriers and provided a template to help each client gain access to healthy food.

Many participants reported that it was the best conference yet and I agree. The next morning I was thinking about Captain Jose Santiago’s (Chester Salvation Army) comments about coming to New England in winter from Puerto Rico where life was bustling, food was spicy and church was noisy to a town where no one was seen after the sun went down. I also marveled when Lynn Kugel from PathwaysPA told us that a woman with one child needs to earn over $60,000 to live comfortably. No wonder many of our working poor struggle.

Dr. Mary Powell from Neumann talked about how only 10% of adults read proficiently at a 10th grade level. Many of our handouts and instructions need to account for the lower 30% who have basic or less than basic skills and have difficulty with charts, detailed instructions and too much information. As a health educator, this was important to hear.

A wonderful panel of two medical doctors, a PhD and Outreach director gave us information on nutrition over the lifespan from low birth weight and premature babies to the elderly. Anne Ayella from Nutrition Development Services talked about how the Archdiocese of Philadelphia started offering school lunches, after school snacks and now administers the summer meal program.

Amanda Archibald, who is a food consultant (Field to Plate) gave us a roadmap template to look at our clients (or groups of clients) and assess food resources they possess and what is missing to better meet their needs. This activity challenged our thinking about food resources. Many of our clients need more than a handout of food, although this helps. Can we teach them to mix those canned green beans into a casserole with the pasta and soup? Can we help our ethnic clients to keep the healthy items in their native diet when they adopt an American way of eating?

A good conference makes you think and challenges you to take action. 76% of our attendees listed an action that they plan to take as a result of the conference and 96% said that they would share the information with others. If you didn’t get to the Hunger conference this year, we’ll be sponsoring a 4th annual conference next March.

March is National Nutrition Month – celebrate how good food creates healthy bodies. Let’s help those with limited access to food eat healthy too. A food resource guide can be found at http://www.co.delaware.pa.us/humanservices/emgfood.html

Day Two of our Guest Blogger Fran Alloway!

If you haven’t been to a food cupboard, you might be surprised to see that some of the people seeking food have jobs. These “working poor” may have a paycheck that doesn’t stretch far enough to pay for housing, utilities, medicines and other necessary expenses. By the end of the month, they find their cupboards bare and their children hungry. Sometimes this is referred to as“heat or eat”. Other people have medical conditions that make it impossible for them to work and their benefits don’t cover their needs. Most food cupboards provide food for about 15 meals per family member. Some sites have had to cut back meals so more people can receive food from their cupboard.

When money is short, hungry people may also face homelessness. Delaware County has several shelters for families in Chester and also houses some families in motels near the airport. Preparing food for a family in a motel room would be a challenge for most of us! DIFAN has started to collect crock pots, can openers and other utensils to assist this population.

In 2008, a group of staff from agencies that work with low income citizens decided to host a conference focused on hunger in Delaware County. Over 100 people attended and gained an increased awareness of the needs of food cupboards and excitement about reaching out to feed their needy neighbors. Three years later, we are planning the 2011 conference, The Challenge of Feeding Our Diverse Communities in Delaware County, which be held on March 1, 2011 at Widener University. This year we will be highlighting how food insecurity affects the health of individuals from infants to seniors, food access issues faced by our immigrants, and health literacy.

As part of the 2010 conference, DIFAN food cupboard participants and workers talked about food security problems that they faced in a video, Meeting the Challenge of Hunger in Delaware County. The video can be viewed at http://delaware.extension.psu.edu. The video also shows other food resources available to those in Delaware County such as the Fresh for All free fruit and vegetable distribution from Philabundance in Upper Darby, hot meals at CityTeam, WIC supplemental food vouchers for pregnant moms and children up to 5 years old and home delivered meals from the Bernardine Center for seniors. Thanks go to the United Way of Southeast Delaware County and Sam and Sam Meats for help in funding this video. Copies of the video are available by calling my office at 610-690-2655. Be prepared, it is quite moving!

Want to know where to find organizations providing food, food vouchers, nutrition education, housing assistance and other resources in our county? A wonderful food resource guide was created in 2010 by the hunger conference committee. This can be found on the Delaware County Cooperative Extension website, http://delaware.extension.psu.edu Two versions are available, one a pocket guide for quick reference and a second with more details. These references should be available shortly on the County of Delaware website, along with the DIFAN brochure, so hungry people can find help more easily.

Thanks for the United Way of Southeast Delaware County for the opportunity to talk about hunger this week on their blog!