6.18.2015 Now is the time to show your organization’s support for the Stop Child Summer Hunger Act of 2015 (H.R. 2715 / S. 5242), legislation that would expand access to Summer Electronic Benefits Transfer (EBT) for Children.
Summer EBT is a federal demonstration project that has been shown to decrease food insecurity and support healthy eating during the summer months when children lose access to nutritious, affordable school meals. Summer EBT provides families with nutrition assistance benefits to purchase groceries from supermarkets and other food stores. The benefits are available to families with children in grades K-12 who are eligible for free or reduced-price school meals.
Summer EBT works, but it’s not at work in California. Representative Susan Davis (CA-53) and Senator Patty Murray (WA) have introduced the Stop Child Summer Hunger Act of 2015 to ensure low-income children across the country have access to Summer EBT. Join us in encouraging our California Representatives and Senators to become co-sponsors of this important legislation that is so critical to the health and success of kids in our state. Strong support for Summer EBT is necessary now as Congress has already begun to discuss Child Nutrition Reauthorization (set to expire in September 2015).
If you would like to add your organization to the coalition letter (below), please send an email to Elyse Homel Vitale at elyse@cfpa.net by Wednesday, July 15th.
Read the coalition letter. PDF
Learn more about California’s summer nutrition gap. link
View CFPA’s Summer EBT Fact Sheet. PDF
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Co-sponsor the Stop Child Summer Hunger Act of 2015 The undersigned California-based organizations are writing to express our united support for H.R. 2715 / S. 1539, a bill that has the power to significantly decrease child hunger during the summer months. We are a diverse group of organizations from across the state of California representing anti-hunger, public health, social service, direct service, and education. We have come together to ask our California Senators and Representatives to co-sponsor the Stop Child Summer Hunger Act of 2015 and to maintain support when this topic is discussed and debated in the Reauthorization of the Child Nutrition Act. In a nation with as many resources as the United States, we expect that our children spend their summer days learning, growing, and playing – not worrying about when and where they’ll have their next meal. Yet, each summer, millions of kids in California and across the country have uncertain access to an absolutely essential resource: nutritious meals. Our children deserve better and we look to you to help ensure that all kids have an equal opportunity to reach their full potential. Children must have access to nutritious meals, regardless of the season, in order to be and achieve their very best. In 2014, nearly 2 million Californian kids who benefitted from federally funded, free or reduced-price lunches during the school year missed out on similar lunches during the summer. Even more worrisome, the most recent available data indicates that at least 2 million families with children in California struggle with food insecurity (the inability to consistently afford enough food). Representative Susan Davis of California and Senator Patty Murray of Washington have introduced the Stop Child Summer Hunger Act (H.R. 2715 / S. 1539), a policy solution that fills in the gap in access to nutritious meals during the summertime. H.R. 2715 / S. 1539 would expand access to a summer nutrition model that has been proven effective: the Summer Electronic Benefits Transfer (EBT) for Children program. In its test phase, Summer EBT eliminated the most severe form of food insecurity by one-third and reached up to 75 percent of eligible children. Children who participated in Summer EBT also ate more fruits and vegetables and whole grains, as well as fewer added sugars from sweetened beverages. Summer EBT would complement the federal summer meal programs that are currently operating at sites in California and throughout the nation. When and where these sites are able to reach kids, they provide a tremendous service. However, 80 percent of low-income California kids who benefit from much-needed school meals are not served by summer meal sites. The congregate feeding approach on its own is unlikely to meet the nutritional demands of all children in need, particularly those who face transportation issues, extreme weather conditions, a lack of walkable routes, threats to neighborhood safety, or other barriers that impede their access to summer meal sites. Not one child in this land of plenty should go without enough food. The Summer EBT for Children demonstration serves as a well-tested effective model for providing summertime nutrition assistance to all children in need. Please join Representative Davis and Senator Murray in taking a stand against childhood hunger. Sincerely, [Organizations in Alphabetical Order] |
Questions? Contact Elyse Homel Vitale at 510.433.1122 ext. 206
