Home > Take Action > Action Alert - 8/15/05

TO: Anti-Hunger Allies

FR: Food Research and Action Center

RE: August Recess Activities in Support of Food Stamp Program

We strongly urge you to take actions during the August congressional recess (through September 5th), including contacting Members of Congress in order to protect the Food Stamp Program when FY 2006 Budget Reconciliation decisions are made in September.

We appreciate the work that you and other allies across the country have done to date to help safeguard the Food Stamp Program from budget cuts. As we near this critical juncture in the budget process, however, we have been warned that the “long knives” are out for food stamps. Therefore, we ask you to redouble your efforts on behalf of vulnerable people. The period during August and the Labor Day weekend in September provide a lot of opportunities for contact with Members and their staff and for media work.

This memorandum reviews the legislative timetable and outlook. It also outlines a menu of six key strategies that advocates can use to get their messages across.

The six priority actions are: 1) talk to Members of Congress during their town hall meetings or district office hours; 2) invite Members of Congress to visit emergency feeding programs, food stamp offices, or other nutrition program sites; 3) speak out about the Food Stamp Program at USDA’s 2007 Farm Bill Forums; 4) join with children’s, health care, and other human needs advocates at federal budget forums; 5) generate media attention to the Food Stamp Program through letters to the editor, editorials, and op-eds; and 6) broaden sign-ons to the letter being circulated opposing food stamp cuts.

Please select the activities that are most suitable for your area and group. We strongly encourage you, however, to undertake two or more of these actions.

Below we provide information and links to resources that may help you execute the strategies. We welcome your feedback, your suggestions for additional strategies, and your requests for technical assistance.

A. Legislative Situation and Outlook: “Long Knives” Out for Food Stamps
B. Targets and Messages
C. Six Priority Actions for August Recess
Let FRAC Partner with You

A. Legislative Situation and Outlook: “Long Knives” Out for Food Stamps

By September 16, 2005, the House and Senate Agriculture Committees must pass legislation to cut $3 billion/five years in spending from programs under their jurisdiction. The pressure for the Agriculture Committees to comply is great—failing to meet the target time would transfer the decision-making power to the hands of the Budget Committees. Work in each Agriculture Committee is likely to continue behind the scenes until each panel “marks up” its respective bill (on or about September 13th, 14th, 15th or 16th). Subsequently, Senate and House Agriculture Committee recommendations would be combined with those from some other committees in the respective chambers that also must achieve savings (such as from Medicaid). Special Senate rules limit debate on “reconciliation” legislation, removing the filibuster threat as a means to forestall budget cuts. After action on the “floor” in each chamber to pass a cross-program reconciliation bill, a Senate-House conference committee likely would iron out differences between the two bills.

In addition to achieving budget cuts, the FY 2006 Budget Reconciliation bill may also be the vehicle for reauthorization of the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) Program. Unlike the Senate version, the House TANF bill (H.R. 240) would allow five states optional food stamp block grants and provide extraordinary executive branch authority to waive Food Stamp Program rules in any state. The House TANF bill provisions would undermine the entitlement status and national benefit structure that allows the Food Stamp Program to respond effectively to changes in need.

Both Senate Agriculture Committee Chairman Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) and House Agriculture Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) have indicated that all major program sectors under their jurisdiction (commodity, conservation, and nutrition) will contribute to the $3 billion in savings. Some farm groups have suggested that $1.7 billion to $2 billion of the $3 billion could come from the Food Stamp Program alone. On July 27th, one Member of Congress, who spoke up on behalf of the Food Stamp Program, underscored the dangers: “’The long knives are out for food stamps,’ said North Dakota Democrat Earl Pomeroy, who asked Goodlatte on Wednesday if public nutrition programs would be cut.” (Source: “As Congress cuts USDA budget, food stamps eyed,” by Charles Abbott, Reuters, 7/28/05).

B. Targets and Messages

Targets: All Members of Congress, but especially Senate and House Leaders and Members of the Senate and House Agriculture Committees. For contact information for Members of the Senate and House Agriculture Committees and their staff, go to http://www.frac.org/Legislative/Congress_Contacts.html. Check http://thomas.loc.gov for information on an individual Member’s Capitol Hill and district office information. The Capitol switchboard number is 202-225-3121.

Message: Protect the Food Stamp Program’s Funding and Structure—Keep any budget cuts as close to zero as possible; reject optional block grants and extraordinary waiver authority.

Ask Members of Congress to convey that message to Senate and House Leaders (Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) and Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV)) and Chairmen and Ranking Members of the Senate and House Agriculture Committees (Senators Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) and Tom Harkin (D-IA) and Representatives Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) and Collin Peterson (D-MN)).

C. Six Priority Actions for August Recess:

1) Meet with Members of Congress during their town hall meetings or district office hours.

Most Members of Congress will be at home during all or part of the August recess. Many will conduct town hall meetings, attend state fairs and other public events, and hold office hours open to constituents to come in to talk.

Call your Member of Congress’ scheduler and ask for an appointment for you or a delegation of groups to talk with him/her about the Food Stamp Program. Ask about any forums or town hall meetings on his/her schedule. Some event information may be posted on websites for either the Member or the local newspaper. Check such websites periodically throughout the month for news of upcoming events.

At your meeting with the Member of Congress (or in a question and answer session at a Town Hall event), share information about hunger and the role of the Food Stamp Program in your community. Please see “Why Food Stamps Matter—Talking Points,” prepared by FRAC, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and America’s Second Harvest—The Nation’s Food Bank Network.

Present the Member of Congress with a copy of the national sign on letter that FRAC, CBPP and America’s Second Harvest—The Nation’s Food Bank Network have spearheaded. Contact ichavez@frac.org (202-986-2200 x3017) or check the FRAC website (www.frac.org/pdf/signed_fs.pdf) for the latest list of group sign-ons from your state.

2) Invite Members of Congress and other opinion leaders to visit emergency feeding programs, food stamp offices, or other nutrition program sites

Two good examples of program site visits to educate lawmakers and their staff about the extent of hunger in the community and the danger that cuts to food stamps pose this year were a “Hunger Tour” in Salt Lake City and Senate Agriculture Committee Ranking Member Tom Harkin (D-IA)’s recent visit to the food bank in Des Moines. During a spring congressional recess period, Utah advocates arranged for Senate staff to visit a food pantry, food stamp office and WIC clinic and generated local press. Senator Harkin’s remarks at the Iowa Food Bank on July 22nd served as a public reaffirmation of his opposition to Food Stamp Program cuts. Please see a press release from Food Bank of Iowa.

FRAC staff can provide technical assistance in planning for a program site visit. Feel free to contact evollinger@frac.org.

3) Speak out about the Food Stamp Program at USDA’s 2007 Farm Bill Forums

Check FRAC’s website for information, talking points and resources you can use to participate in USDA’s 2007 Farm Bill Forums (including some later forums, on dates not yet announced, that will focus specifically on nutrition assistance). Check a statement made by Hunger Solutions Minnesota’s Paul Gifford.

The next sessions, which are on the Farm Bill overall, are slated for August 16th (9:00 a.m. - 12 noon) at Penn State University's Ag Progress Days in University Park; August 17th (4:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.) in Jackson Hole, WY; and August 18th (4:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.) in Indianapolis. See Farm Bill Events Calendar.

Generating numerous and diverse stakeholder comments in support of the Food Stamp Program at the USDA Farm Bill Forums could influence USDA, media and other opinion leaders and help improve program outcomes in Congress this year as well as in 2007. The road to 2007 begins in 2005, by protecting the funding and structure of the Food Stamp Program.

For feedback and/or assistance on 2007 Farm Bill planning, contact evollinger@frac.org.

4) Join with children’s, health care, and other human needs advocates to dvelop federal budget forums

Around the country, advocates are planning actions this summer to tell Congress and the public about the need to protect low-income children, families, the elderly, and people with disabilities from service cuts.

“Federal Budget Forums” have been organized in Colorado, Iowa, Minnesota and Utah; and state hunger data releases or other food stamp events have been organized in Montana, Ohio, Oregon, Nevada, and Pennsylvania.

For more information contact evollinger@frac.org.

5) Generate media attention on the Food Stamp Program through letters to the editor, editorials, and op-eds

Editorials, op-eds, and letters to the editor provide excellent ways to support the Food Stamp Program. Partners in op-eds (as in a recent op-ed by the food stamp agency head and the local anti-hunger organization head in Vermont) can be particularly effective.

New polling information may be of interest to your local media. According to a recent national poll, commissioned by the Alliance to End Hunger and conducted by McLaughlin and Associates, 75 percent of voters say the food stamp program should be protected from cuts by the administration or Congress even in a tight budget year. Please check poll details.

For additional “hooks” for letters to the editor, watch for stories that focus on low-income working families. For example, new poverty data are expected to be released on August 30th. Let your media know that poor children can ill afford to have cuts to the nutrition safety net. Stories about the unemployment rate are likely to run across the country when the US Department of Labor reports monthly jobless statistics on August 5th and September 2nd. Labor Day weekend coverage also likely will provide you with opportunities to comment on the importance of food stamp benefits for workers struggling at low wage jobs with few benefits. For technical assistance on developing recess media, contact evollinger@frac.org.

Below are links to good recent examples of editorials, op-eds and a letter to the editor in support of the Food Stamp Program.

“Food stamps unfairly devoured by politics," Guest Column, by Linda Stone of Children’s Alliance, Spokane Spokesman-Review, 8/3/05

"A food program in jeopardy," Editorial, The Oregonian, 8/1/05

"Congress tries to stick it to food-stamp recipients," Editorial, StatesmanJournal, 7/30/05

“Protect Food Stamps,” Editorial, Burlington Free Press, 7/28/05

“Summer means hunger for too many Vt. Children,” Opinion, by Robert Dostis, State Representative and Vermont Campaign to End Childhood Hunger Executive Director and Renee W. Richardson, Food and Nutrition Program chief, Vermont Department for Children and Families, Economic Services Division, Burlington Free Press, 7/25/05

“Hungry Kids, Greedy Farmers,” Editorial, Washington Post, 7/25/05

“Food-stamp success,” Letter to the Editor, by Carolyn Benefiel, Wichita Eagle, 7/27/05 (scroll down to find this headline)

"Protect food stamp program from cuts," Op-Ed by Bill Bolling, executive director of the Atlanta Community Food Bank, and Pat Showall, executive director of Families First, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 5/2/05

6) Broaden sign ons to the food stamp letter.

An organization sign-on letter in support of the Food Stamp Program posted on the FRAC website will be given to Congress later in August. We urge you join us in sending a strong message to Congress to protect the Food Stamp Program against budget cuts and damaging structural changes.

A). If you have not done so already, sign your organization on the letter using this form (http://www.frac.org/Legislative/Budget_06/Alerts/signOn070705.html).

B) E-mail this request to other organization partners and encourage them to sign on.

C) Send your own individual letter to your Senators and Representative (feel free to borrow ideas and language from the group letter).

Let FRAC Partner with You

Again, we appreciate your many efforts to date. We look forward to continued work together in the days and weeks to come.

We hope that you will mount the activities that are most suitable for your area and group. For feedback and/or additional assistance, please contact evollinger@frac.org; eteller@frac.org; lparker@frac.org; or ichavez@frac.org.