Take action against hunger

To the editor:

This coming week — beginning Saturday, April 15 — is Riverdale Restaurant Week.

We are celebrating our local community, boosting our local economy, and engaging  our diversity. We have such resilience and resourcefulness to acknowledge in the stories behind each of these 33 establishments. And they very much need our patronage and support.

Yet equally important is that we contribute to those in this season that are struggling with hunger. This is a widespread mostly invisible issue in our neighborhoods affecting many who are living on fixed incomes, or whose incomes are not keeping up with inflation.

Let’s look at the facts. According to a 2018-2020 report from Hunger Free America, the Bronx was reported as the city’s “hungriest borough with one in four residents experiencing food insecurity.” This does not take into consideration the effects of the removal in March of increased Supplementary Nutrition Assistance Program awards that were in effect during the pandemic, or the increase in prices caused by the inflation of the past year.

A February article from The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities notes “the end of the temporary (emergency allotments) will be a significant change that will increase food hardship for many individuals and families, given the modest amount of basic SNAP benefits and high recent inflation in food prices. Without the (emergency allotments), SNAP benefits will average only about $6.10 per person per day in 2023. That’s $42.70 a week for groceries.”

To put this $42.70 in perspective, consider an article from the U.S. News & World Report that said, according to the Consumer Price Index, the “average cost of eating food at home has risen 11.4 percent in 2022 versus 2021. For a thrifty budget for a family of four, you would spend $225.60 a week, or $977.70 a month.”

(The Thrifty Food Plan, incidentally, is used to decide the benefit amounts for the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program, or SNAP.)

The effects of these changes have got local food advocates worried as they are noticing a rise in the number of local folks seeking food aid in this season.

So what can we do? One action we are planning is to provide fresh food for the Friendly Fridge Bronx, on West 242nd Street. On Sunday, April 16 at 10 a.m., we’re going to make sandwiches at the Bronx Burger House, located at 5816 Mosholu Ave., to put in the fridge, and then taking a walk down Broadway to the Friendly Fridge to bring a bit of awareness to hunger that our community faces.

Volunteers are needed. Please email laura4bronx@gmail.com.

Another thing we can do is make donations to local organizations that are supporting food aid. Some of these include: The Farm to Fridge Network (rdfeld@aol.com), Riverdale Senior Services-Center for Ageless Living (RSSNY.org/give), The Riverdale Y Senior Center (p2p.onecause.com/foodforseniors/donate), KRMH Food Pantry (P.O. Box 251 Riverdale Station, Bronx, N.Y. 10471), and the Marble Hill Food Pantry at St. Stephen’s Methodist Church.

But let’s be honest, these kinds of actions are not remedies. They are efforts by good and kind folks to bring attention to a much larger and very serious problem. 

We are suggesting that we form a local task force of elected officials, community board members, food advocates and community activists to assess the needs of our Riverdale, Spuyten Duyvil, Van Cortlandt, Marble Hill and Kingsbridge neighborhoods.

How well are the needs of our community being supported by the various city, state, federal agencies, local pantries and community organizations? What can be done to find more resources to supplement these efforts? Who will join us in this effort?

Rick Feldman

Laura Levine-Pinedo