BRATTLEBORO — Ten percent of Vermonters don't have enough food to eat every month.
Yet, in the experience of members of the Hunger Council of the Windham Region, few community members understand the extent of hunger in the state.
Jenna O'Donnell, Hunger Council manager with Hunger Free Vermont, the statewide nonprofit that organizes the local group and nine other similar councils throughout the state, said that Vermonters can “work their butts off and still struggle.”
The local Hunger Council, which met at the Winston Prouty Campus on July 10, is comprised of representatives from multiple local and state human service agencies.
According to numbers compiled by Hunger Free Vermont, a family of four living in a rural area (outside Chittenden County), with both parents working full-time, earning Vermont's minimum wage of $10.78 an hour, can still come up short.
When compiling its data, Hunger Free Vermont uses as its benchmark the basic-needs budget of the Vermont Joint Fiscal Office (JFO), which figures that a family of four needs to earn $4,917 per month, or $59,004 per year.
That figure presumes two wage earners and two children in the household, and that the family has access to employer-sponsored health insurance.
This amount would cover needs such as food, housing, transportation, dental insurance, personal expenses, and savings.
This basic needs budget does not include child care.
O'Donnell pointed out that at minimum wage, two wage earners bring in $3,708 a month, a little under 25 percent less than the JFO's basic-needs budget.
Even adding $413 a month through supplemental nutrition programs such as 3SquaresVT and WIC, this hypothetical family of four still runs a monthly deficit, O'Donnell said.
For some, services are inadequate
“There are folks who don't understand that their neighbors are experiencing hunger,” said council member Margaret Atkinson, director of development and community relations at Winston Prouty Center for Child and Family Development.
Many people don't know, for example, that one of the growing cohorts of hungry Vermonters is elders, according to council members.
Lisa Pitcher, executive director of the Our Place Drop-In Center of Bellows Falls, said most people are surprised when they learn their neighbors go hungry.
Hunger came to light for multiple communities after Tropical Storm Irene in 2011, she said. For example, emergency responders reported going into houses that from the outside appeared that the inhabitants had plenty of economic resources. Inside, however, the cupboards were bare.
“From the outside looking in, it never seemed that these people [didn't] have food in their house,” Pitcher said.
The Hunger Council members discussed how to communicate the urgency of hunger and educate communities on the importance of nutrition programs such as universal school meals.
“Food is pretty fundamental, and hunger is pretty fundamental,” said Sue Graff, field services director for the Vermont Agency of Human Services.
Yet the community as a whole doesn't understand the societal problems that leave people's pantries empty.
“Why shouldn't people get their basic needs met?” asked Graff.
Pitcher said that part of the question is why the services designed to help feed people are inadequate. For example, the money families receive from a supplemental nutrition program, such as 3SquaresVT, lasts only two to three weeks.
These families then need to go to a food shelf to have enough food for the rest of the month, she said.
Graff asked if Hunger Free Vermont could compile regular data points on hunger in the region, as such facts could help council members ground their community conversations in facts.
Pitcher added that it would help to include non-food issues and services, such as fuel assistance, in the talking points because all household expenses influence people's choices when it comes to buying food.
Many expenses people can't fudge, like paying rent, Pitcher said. “But you can choose to go without food.”
Graff added that so many of the conditions that leave people hungry are systemic. In her opinion, most of the issues circle back to income inequality.
“This council could work their butts off to get people services, but if people had more money” it would mean they wouldn't need the services in the first place, she said.
Graff noted how often the community's conversation around wages turns to scarcity.
The belief is that “if you get more, then I'll get less. That's not true,” Graff said. “But, philosophically if we can't agree on those things, then we're going nowhere.”
Atkinson agreed, saying the council needed to help people understand that “the solutions to these problems belong to all of us and will improve all of our lives.”
In Windham County area, 19 summer meal sites
According to data from the Montpelier-based Public Assets Institute, Vermont ranks fifth of the six New England states when it comes to wages.
“Universal meals is a good test balloon,” Graff added. “It's less controversial because kids are dependent [on adults] to get needs met, where adults are not.”
Kira Sawyer-Hartigan for the Windham Southeast Supervisory Union reported that this year's summer meals kickoff on June 28 at the Retreat Farm was “awesome,” with 172 people served.
This summer, Brattleboro hosts nine summer meal sites. According to Hunger Free Vermont, the Windham Region hosts 19 open sites (these do not include “closed sites” at programs such as summer camps), plus one in Chester, and three in Springfield.
The Windham Region served by the regional Hunger Council was recently expanded to include areas in Windsor County as well.
Sawyer-Hartigan also reported that Bellows Falls kicked off its summer meals programs at the middle school. Organizers in Bellows Falls are helping with food in Springfield as well.
Millions of dollars left on the table
According to Hunger Free Vermont, just over 36,000 Vermont school-age children rely on school breakfast and lunch to provide their nutrition. But the reliable access to meals ends for many children when the summer vacation begins.
In response, nearly 300 sites across the state will serve free meals and snacks to kids and teens over the summer through the Summer Food Service Program.
Summer meal sites serve everyone 18 and younger. Kids and teens just need to show up and eat.
“Vermont schools and community groups work tirelessly to establish as many summer meal sites as possible, and their diligence and commitment to children have enabled Vermont to be ranked second in the country for providing kids summer meals,” said Monica Taylor, development director for Hunger Free Vermont.
Taylor referenced Vermont's ranking in a new report released by the Food Research & Action Center (FRAC), called “Hunger Doesn't Take a Vacation: Summer Nutrition Status Report 2019.”
“Despite this noteworthy achievement, in 2018, this federal program reached only 31 percent of Vermont children who relied on school meals,” Taylor said. “Without proper nutrition, low-income students are at risk of losing two months of both reading and math skills over summer break.”
Vermont is not alone in reaching fewer children eligible for summer meals than it reaches during a school year.
According to the FRAC report released this month, in July 2018, Summer Nutrition Programs served lunch on average to one child for every seven children who participated in free and reduced-price school lunch during the 2017–2018 school year.
The FRAC report also noted that when kids miss summer meals, their state and local community also miss out on receiving sustainable federal funding that can help fight hunger locally.
“For every lunch that an eligible child did not receive in 2018, the state and communities missed out on $3.86 per child in federal Summer Food Service Program funding,” the report writers noted.
That means, the report says, that “many millions of dollars were left on the table.”