The NY Common Pantry sent me a tax receipt letter for $270 in donations to this nonprofit in 2020.
The meals I bought for people in need I hadn’t realized would total over $200 in 7 months.
I did this via “buying” two $5 donations when I ordered groceries via FreshDirect each week. One $5 donation provides 4 pantry meals for a person in need.
Beto O’Rourke in the article I link to at the end of this blog entry wrote with two other authors that expanding and fortifying the food stamps / SNAP benefits program is cost-effective.
Whereas forcing people to use food pantries is wasteful.
O’Rourke and the two other authors’ rationale for the beauty of the SNAP program makes perfect sense to me.
For now I’m OK with donating money for meals to NY Common Pantry.
It’s because in our right-wing political climate nothing has been “right” in terms of fostering social justice.
50 million Americans are estimated to live with food insecurity.
Since Mr. Toupee (my nickname for the former president) and his ilk were keen only to tamp down on programs that benefit citizens in economic need I think my funding of the food bank is an OK stopgap measure for now.
I had no idea that my weekly donations would add up so high so quickly.
In the time of the pandemic I’ve had a refrigerator bursting with food.
I’m able-bodied and strong enough to have carried home from a market 50-pound bags of groceries when I couldn’t get an online food delivery.
Now that LL Cool Joe (my nickname for Joe Biden) takes office I pray that real lasting effective change comes to our country.
No American should go hungry. No American should live in poverty.
The article about the rationale of expanding the SNAP benefits is here:
Flourish 