Hunger in America 2010

Feeding America released their Hunger in America 2010 report on Monday and it shows some shocking results nationwide, but especially here in Santa Barbara.

Key findings in this report regarding Santa Barbara County

The FA system served by The Foodbank of Santa Barbara County provides emergency food for an estimated 88,900 different people annually

32% of the members of households served by The Foodbank of Santa Barbara County are children under 18 years old

47% of households include at least one employed adult

Among households with children, 64% are food insecure and 22% are food insecure with very low food security

41% of clients served by The Foodbank of Santa Barbara County report having to choose between paying for food and paying for utilities or heating fuel

32% had to choose between paying for food and paying for medicine or medical care

25% of households served by The Foodbank of Santa Barbara County report having at least one household member in poor health

The Foodbank of Santa Barbara County included approximately 242 agencies at the administration of this survey, of which 178 have responded to the agency survey. Of the responding agencies, 113 had at least one food pantry, soup kitchen, or shelter.

As many as 89% of pantries, 92% of kitchens, and 68% of shelters in The Foodbank of Santa Barbara County use volunteers.

Speaking of volunteers, have you volunteered at the Organic Soup Kitchen yet?

Solving Hunger in America

at Austin's SXSW conference? It may sound like a strange combination, but putting tech leaning minds together have brought solutions to many problems once thought daunting. Hunger just might be the next one solved.

The annual SXSW festival of music, film and interactive may be well known for its party atmosphere—they don’t call it “spring break for geeks” for nothing—but this year’s conference also set a lofty goal: to end hunger in America.

A mere glint in the eye of organizers last year, partners from across the spectrum of social entrepreneurship, non-profit organizations and tech innovators came together on Monday morning for the inaugural CauseLab. Designed as an “action tank,” WeCanEndThis.com brought in participants and leaders to spend half the day in one of two sessions addressing three fundamental angles of solving hunger in this country:

• Create hunger-free communities
• Humanize hunger using data
• Accelerate local action and advocacy

....Facing the problem of hunger head on is intimidating. If you look at the pure numbers—49 million Americans don’t know where their next meal is coming from—it can seem insurmountable. Breaking down hunger into solvable chunks is critical, and the teams in the room struggled to answer the call of getting past awareness campaigns. We’ve been inundated with slickly produced messages telling us that even $5 makes a difference, but it’s rare that we find programs that actually reward us with tangible knowledge that we’ve made a difference—and thus inspire us to participate again in the future. - AlterNet

We hope that you will come join us on Sundays at the Veterans Memorial Building for that tangible knowledge you've made a difference.