Barbara Lee Joins Faith Leaders in Taking the Food Stamp Challenge 2011

Press Release

Congresswoman Barbara Lee (D-Oakland) joined national faith leaders from the Fighting Poverty with Faith coalition, senior members of the Obama Administration, and many of her Democratic colleagues at a Washington, D.C. supermarket to announce the start of the Food Stamp Challenge 2011.

The Food Stamp Challenge is a nationwide event intended to preserve funding for vital nutrition benefits during a time of record poverty and unacceptably high unemployment. Fighting Poverty with Faith challenges everyone to live for one week on the food budget of someone surviving on Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits, or what is commonly called, food stamps.

The average benefit for an entire month is $133.79, which works out to $4.50 a day or $1.50 a meal. Participants are being asked to limit their entire food budget for the week of October 27 to November 3 to $31.50.

"I am again taking part in this challenge because I believe that it is unconscionable to make cuts to programs that feed America's poor and our nation's children during the height of an economic crisis," said Congresswoman Lee. "We must fight against any efforts to balance the budget on the backs of the most vulnerable Americans. I hope that everyone will consider joining the Food Stamp Challenge and joining the effort to end poverty in America."

As co-chair of the Congressional Poverty Caucus, Congresswoman Lee plans to introduce legislation next month to cut poverty by half in ten years. The bill would create an interagency working group tasked with developing and enacting a national plan to better coordinate anti-poverty and job creation programs.

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