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Food distribution draws hundreds

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BY ART HOVEY / Lincoln Journal Star

Wednesday, Nov 15, 2006 - 12:13:55 am CST

One hundred people waited in line an hour before an annual pre-Thanksgiving distribution of food and $10 food certificates began Tuesday at the F Street Recreation Center in Lincoln.

By the time volunteers were ready to start handing out the frozen turkeys, chickens and other provisions, the line had grown to more than 200.

Nicole Willis, 37 and mother of two teenage sons, choked back tears as she tried to describe the importance of the food she was carrying away in her plastic sacks.

Story Photo
Three lines are set up to serve people Friday. (Eric Gregory)

“Whether you’re homeless or just low-income, we can’t afford to feed our own families,” she said.

As young mothers clutching babies and elderly people pushing walkers joined Willis in the procession toward the exit, Jennifer Hernandez of Nebraska Appleseed talked about the disconnect between plenty and not enough.

Between 50,000 farmers and 80,000-plus Nebraskans eligible for food stamps. Between annual food-production stockpiles in the state big enough to feed 7 million people and 27,000 Lancaster County residents who live below the federal poverty line.

And she pointed to the importance of strengthening the food stamps portion of the farm bill as Congress gets ready to work on new, multi-year legislation.

“Farmers aren’t the only ones who should be paying attention to the farm bill re-authorization,” she said.

Nebraska Appleseed wants pressure put on federal lawmakers, for example, to reverse a pattern in which food stamps spending has been cut by more than $30 billion over the past 10 years, and to raise the ceiling on personal assets set at $2,000.

“That has not been raised for decades,” Hernandez said.

Willis said a job that pays her about $10 an hour for working four days a week puts her above the income eligibility limit.

In a city known for offering job security and relatively attractive benefit packages to thousands of university and state government workers, Lu-Ann Buffkins provided another poverty contrast at the rec center.

Buffkins, 52, an Omaha native and four-year resident of Lincoln, said she spent much of 2006 living in a tent in a local park and in her 1974 Dodge truck. Only recently was she able to find work as a security guard and get off the street.

The truck’s transmission is “really crazy” and slow to engage when she moves the gearshift to reverse. That explains why she had to gun the engine and wait a few seconds to move away from the curb Tuesday.

How could she be going hungry in a state that produces so much food?

“You tell me,” Buffkins responded. “I don’t know.”

Not far away, Hernandez monitored the Rec Center scene with Scott Young of the Lincoln Food Bank and Beatty Brasch of the local Center for People in Need.

Nobody needs to tell any of them how important the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the food stamps program are in confronting hunger.

Young said USDA annually provides about 700,000 pounds of food to the Food Bank.

“The Agriculture Department is one of the largest feeding entities in the country.”

Despite that, Brasch said, the food supply never seems to catch up with demand.

“The need has significantly increased,” she said. “The rate of poverty is up. The number of hungry people is up.”

But Hernandez said taxpayers here and elsewhere shouldn’t regard food stamps as a drain on government resources.

In a report released Tuesday and titled “Not Just for Farmers,” the center said that every $1 billion spent on food stamps supports 3,300 farm jobs. Every $5 spent on food stamps returns $10 to a local economy.

Food stamps are an often vital option for elderly people on fixed incomes and for keeping younger people in the workforce.

“Food is the elastic part of the budget that gets cut,” Hernandez said. “Whenever they can’t do it, they cut food first.

“Nobody should have to stand in line for a Thanksgiving meal,” she said, “or for any meal.”

Reach Art Hovey at (402) 523-4949 or ahovey@alltel.net.

On the Web

Readers can access the “Not Just for Farmers” Appleseed Center report at www.neappleseed.org

Food distributed

Lincoln’s Center for People in Need will host three more, pre-Thanksgiving food and food-certificate distributions Thursday.

* Malone Community Center, 2032 U St., from 9:30 a.m. to 2 p.m.

* Oak Lake Free Evangelical Church, 3300 N. First St., 12:30 p.m. to 6 p.m.

* Easterday Recreation Center, 6130 Adams St., 5 p.m. to 8 p.m.

For more information, call Beatty Brasch or Deb Daily at 476-4357.


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Shame wrote on November 15, 2006 12:32 am:
" Job security and attractive benefit packages to thousands of university and state government - on the backs of the retired who can barely pay the exhorbant property taxes and choose between which pill to take and which to delete and skip doctors appointments. Nebraskas taxes & high cost of living only compounds the problem. Why doesn't the state and city get business and industry in here so people can work for a decent wage. Shame on Nebraska. "
Bill wrote on November 15, 2006 9:24 am:
" Let's not get too carried away with the 'attractive benefit packages to thousands of university and state government'. Although many are doing quite well for themselves, there are just as many of the hourly paid employees, just above minimum wage, working more than one job to make ends meet and pay their bills. Health care cost for the hourly paid employees are the same as they are for those making $50-100 thousand a year. The University and the State should be doing a lot more for their lesser paid employees so they don't have to stand in these lines with the other people who are truly in need. There are so many people in this city that are 1 or 2 paychecks away from being in the same position as these souls. I hope last weeks election sends a message to our legislature. Do something about taxes, health care, economic development [with decent job creation] and get people off these food lines, or be voted out of office. "
se wrote on November 15, 2006 12:39 pm:
" It's a shame to think of how much of the money that was recently spent on all the political campaigns could have helped so many people in need instead. "
LPS worker standing in the food lines wrote on November 15, 2006 12:53 pm:
" I stand in the food lines too--Three foodnets every week. LPS should provide better insurance benefits for us too! LPS pays a decent wage for hourly jobs, but the insurance coverage for families stinks. We're going without health insurance because to take the coverage it would cost us out of our pockets $8,500-9,000 a year. That means my family of seven would have to live on $11,000-12,000 a year! Would like to see some of the administrative folks at the schools, businesses and companies do that! "
KEG wrote on November 15, 2006 12:54 pm:
" How disappointing! In a well done and much needed article pointing out the simple need for people to be more understanding and giving all year long, this disparaging comment is made, “In a city known for offering job security and relatively attractive benefit packages to thousands of university and state government workers, Lu-Ann Buffkins provided another poverty contrast at the rec center.” And this comment is referenced by “Shame” in comments below. As a university employee I often hear this type of generalization. The belief that university and state employee do nothing but are wildly over-compensated. I think this view is wrong and hurtful and does a grave injustice to thousands of people who work very hard to provide an income for their families. Not everyone who works at the university or for the state is making “big bucks”. There are hundreds of people who perform the often tedious tasks it takes to keep these entities in working order. There are people who cook, clean and take care of everyday tasks and they are not getting rich. Yes, the retirement package is good, but the amount of money you put into your retirement that gets matched is based on how much money you make. The majority of the folks who work at the university are not making “big bucks”. I feel like these comments are a slap in the face to every university and state employee who works hard and lives on a budget and does the best they can to get by, just like so many other folks in Lincoln and Nebraska. Shame on you “Shame”, and thank you for your comments “Bill”. "
KK wrote on November 15, 2006 1:14 pm:
" This poverty thing is getting worse and worse and the leadership of the state and city of Lincoln could care less, for example, we haven't even gotten our tax bills for the increase from the over assessed property and already they've voted for a bond to raise taxes again!!! Actions speak louder than words. This world isn't over, their wonderful paychecks can very well dwindle to the poverty line. Constantly raising taxes and doing very little to build and bring business & industry in to create income is only going to continue to drag this state into poverty. This state has spent and is still spending on too much unnessary things, and it will come back to the city. What happens if the Fed. raises taxes. More poverty!!!!! The city has CREATED IT!! "
whatever wrote on November 15, 2006 7:09 pm:
" You can have a much better life in a small town at 9 or 10 bucks an hour than anything you could have in Lincoln for 18 or 19 bucks an hour. I would encourage some of these Lincoln folks making 9 or 10 an hour to look at other towns like Fremont, York, Crete, Columbus, Seward etc where you can find decent housing, decent jobs and much better public education than you will ever find in Lincoln. You will also pay less for food, housing, gas and taxes. Most of these small towns would love to have some newcomers. You have to do some research, but you can make it work. Lincoln's solution is to get more low paying jobs, tax breaks to the rich, tax increases that hurt the poor and middle class and food handouts to the virtual slave labor to keep them alive to do the "dirty work". "
Regarding Hunger wrote on November 15, 2006 10:08 pm:
" Thank God that some people in Lincoln care for the poor. Lincoln is a pretty good place to obtain help if you are poor. Just try living on the street in LA, NY, or Chicago. Lincoln is much safer. "

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