Get Involved - has information about a number of ways that you can learn about and join efforts to end hunger: through donations, volunteer work, advocacy, public education, or a unique community-based method of finding and linking the unique skills of local community residents (Asset-Based Community Development).

What Government Can Do

Goals:

1. Improve the quality of life in Sacramento, California and the US. as a whole.
2. Help meet basic nutritional needs.
3. Reduce the future costs of impaired or delayed physical and psychological development, reduced productivity, and increased health care needs for hungry children and adults.
4. Reduce tile 1need for emergency food assistance and promote the most efficient use of public and private resources.

Recommended Actions for Local Government:

• Establish a Joint City/County Hunger Commission by July 1, 1989 representing public and private sector food and nutrition programs, business, education, religious organizations, and other concerned groups in the community:
  • Implement the actions called for by this report and develop any further actions that address both short and long-term solutions to hunger in Sacramento.
  • Examine the infrastructure barriers to fully implementing federal food programs and propose needed state and federal changes to allow for maximum use of the programs.
  • Examine the long-range capability of primarily voluntary services.
  • Educate the community about local needs.
  • Mobilize community resources to address the problem.
• Provide directories and offer training for local churches and emergency food programs to help them assist and refer people appropriately.
• Fund a Public Health Nutritionist to help coordinate all of these services and build links between emergency services and other food and income-support programs.
• Provide immediate access to information on available food closets, feeding sites, shelters, food stamps and other aid programs through a free access number.
• Expand participation in child nutrition programs:
  • Provide start-up and administrative funding and request state and federal money to expand WIC to more of the eligible population.
  • Increase the number of schools participating in the School Breakfast Program.
  • Provide technical assistance and support to increase the number of child care programs participating in the Child Care Food Program.
  • Increase the number of sites where the Summer Food Program is available.
• Increase accessibility to the Food Stamp Program:
  • Provide food stamp information at all emergency food program sites.
  • Train and use retired professionals as volunteers to help screen and explain the application process to potential food stamp recipients.
  • Use the newly created federal option to decrease and simplify monthly reporting.
  • Explore the need for and feasibility of creating a Food Stamp Hotline.
• Improve the communication and coordination of services related to food and nutrition:
  • Develop training for all public and private service providers to strengthen the existing referral network.
  • Conduct a food and nutrition program outreach campaign.
• Provide county and city land for community gardens, and include fruit and vegetable plants in public landscaping.
• Evaluate the adequacy of food and nutrition service available for seniors.

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