Hello! I’m Audrey Hess in Gettysburg, PA.
I have been working gradually since the New Year on aspects of my Practicum as our Adams County Food Policy Council prepares for a second year of the “Fair Share Project.” The program is designed to reach out to families who are in the “food gap”–above the SNAP cut-off yet with challenges in financially accessing adequate healthy foods. For each of four months from June-September, the families receive $40 in vouchers for shopping at three local farmers’ markets. Participants will choose from activities such as picking up nutrition information and talking with me at the farmers’ market, cooking or gardening classes, a farm tour, and participation in a photovoices project to share their food experiences with each other and hopefully in a community forum.
My current activites with the project are following-up with last year’s participants who are interested in returning, interacting with the community agencies that are providing new referrals for this year, and continuing to coordinate meetings every 2 or 3 weeks with our Fair Share advisory group. A public health professor from Gettysburg College is taking the lead on development of our pre- and post-surveys as well as inspiring us in the development of the photovoices component. I am priveleged to work with her as well as the various other members of the advisory group (community RD, CSA farmer, Gettysburg College Center for Public Service staff and students and a local community health coalition executive director–my practicum supervisor).
Hi Audrey.
I remember in the Community Nutrition course where you explained the “gap” so clearly. There are many people who try to rise out of poverty, but fall back in because they begin to make more than allowed for support like SNAP, but not enough to replace the monetary value of their former SNAP benefits.
I heard recently that while federal spending for SNAP is increasing (largely due to the downturn in the economy), applications for WIC are not increasing. There are theories as to why (WIC has many restrictions on types of foods allowed for purchase), but it’s an area of research that needs to be addressed. This might be an interesting question to ask participants this summer.
Looking forward to hearing more.
That is a very interesting topic–one which personally impacted me through my WIC lay-off a bit over a year ago. At that time, I heard the first murmurings of theorizing about the factors contributing to the what-can-appear-ironic drop in WIC participation–which were similar to what I recently read as well.
I will raise this question with the individual who is designing our surveys to see if this is a query worth adding. Since we’re working with non-SNAP eligible folks, it would not allow for the comparison factor (ie. to ask which assistance program people use and why), but there might be some way to word it to probe for some interesting feedback.
Thanks for the suggestion!
Hi Audrey – this would be worth looking into. The eligibility for WIC is higher than for SNAP, so there should be people in your target group who are eligible for WIC. Keep us posted as you learn more!