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Sacramento Hunger Commission: March 2002 Minutes

1. The meeting was called to order by Chair Rebecca Fuller at 11:40am.
2. The February 19, 2002 meeting minutes were approved unanimously (Romero/Villalobos).
3. Commissioner Reports and Announcements - Sabrina Stewart reported that the City of Sacramento and the Hunger Commission facilitated a Summer Food Outreach Meeting on March 8th and received ideas from the community on new ways to increase participation in the Summer Food program including increased distribution of outreach materials through local churches and better coordination between the Sacramento City Unified School District sites and Infoline. Judie Wilson announced that she will be creating a press release to advertise the Pot and Pans Drive and provided a brief update on the status of the public campaign the Hunger Commission and Senior Gleaners are working on in collaboration with the Food Banks of Northern California. Ms. Wilson noted that the campaign will kick off May 9th and is intended as a "people-raiser" for the Summer Food Program. One of the strategies being used to garner media attention is to invite policymakers or other prominent representatives of Sacramento to serve in a "Leaders Serving Lunch" event. Barbara Finnestead announced that a national campaign will take place in March entitled "March for Meals". Members of the County Board of Supervisors will be delivering hot meals to homebound seniors on March 25-26th. The campaign is intended to raise awareness, money and volunteers for senior nutrition services. Janet Talsky announced that CA WIC will be following new pediatric guidelines to reduce the amount of juice children receive through the WIC Program. In addition, mothers in the WIC Program will see a slight decrease in the number of ounces of baby formula they receive each month because one of the manufacturers reduced their can size from 16oz to 14.3oz in order for it to fit uniformly on the store shelves.
4. Selection of Alternate for the Community Action Board of SETA - Cindy Nelson volunteered to be the Hunger Commission's alternate to Albert Mills on the Community Action Board (CAB) of SETA. Ms. Nelson will now go through the paperwork process to officially be named the alternate.
5. Panel Presentation: Community Gardens in Sacramento - Commissioners Bill Maynard, Cindy Nelson and Richard Schroeder facilitated the panel discussion. Ms. Nelson provided a philosophical overview of the value of Community Gardens and suggested that it is a community and a future that is created when a garden is planted. Ms Nelson warned that the general public has little control over the food system, which is largely in control of a handful of major corporations, and that gardening can be used as a political statement. Ms Nelson stated, "if we choose to grow food, even just one small tomato plant in a container on an apartment balcony, we are making a defiant statement, to take back some element of control of our food system (for the complete text of this presentation, please see attached). Mr. Maynard provided the Commission with an overview of the state of Community Gardening in Sacramento. He noted that there were many informal gardens in Sacramento, but few that were officially recognized by the City or County. Mr. Maynard announced the organization of a county-wide coalition to promote, protect and establish new community gardens in the Sacramento area. The coalition is expected to have a kick-off celebration on Earth Day, April 20th at CSUS. Mr. Maynard expressed a need for a free meeting space for the coalition to have monthly meetings. If you are interested in joining the coalition, please contact Bill Maynard at 341-7789. Mr. Schroeder gave a presentation on the Community Garden at Mather Community Campus (transitional housing). Mr. Schroeder stated that the participants of the garden are often third and fourth generation homeless people who feel isolated. It is not uncommon to find people hoarding food when they first arrive at Mather Community Campus. The garden allowed people to come out of their isolation through communication first with their plants and then when talking to others about what they were growing. The first year the garden had 15 participants, the second year there were 30 participants, the third year there were 45 participants and this year 72 people are gardening. Gardeners are encouraged to share their food in the program's salad bar. A label is affixed stating "this food provided by…" to recognize the gardener who has shared the food. Mr. Schroeder stated that we need to teach people when they are still children how to grow their own food and ideally there should be a community garden is in every school. It was also noted hat the biggest issue concerning community gardens is water (where it is, how to get it, how much it costs).
   
   There were many comments from the overall Commission when the presentations were complete. Gary Little suggested that Community Garden advocates work closely with policymakers to include Community Gardens in land use plans. He encouraged advocates to educate the City Council on the importance of Community Gardens and to work with them to solve some of the main issues with gardens including land use and water. Richard Schroeder responded that Community Gardens need to be included in Parks and Recreation planning as well. Judie Wilson stated that a representative of the Hunger Commission needed to be present at City Council meetings and volunteered to attend the next meeting. Juan Yniguez praised the presenters for their convincing presentations and urged them to research concrete statistics and information for policymakers. He stated that to gain the support of policymakers, advocates need to provide information such as how many people could benefit from Community Gardens and who will they be? Bill Maynard responded that he believed some statistics could be gathered from past and current community garden projects in other cities and would look into it further.
6. Policy Update and Action Items- Sharon Eghigian provided a legislative update, including an update on the California Association of Food Banks' recent Legislative Day at the Capitol. Ms. Eghigian pointed out that it is going to be extremely difficult to find money for new funding in the State budget given the large deficit the State is facing this year. She also thanking the Commissioners who responded to the recent Food Stamp alert and noted the new Farm Bill is now in a Senate/House conference committee. Ms. Eghigian then passed out the California Hunger Action Coalition's (CHAC) Legislative Agenda for 2002 and suggested that the Hunger Commission support it. The Hunger Commission unanimously voted to support the CHAC agenda (see attached) (Yniguez/Wilson).
7. Meeting Evaluation- There was general consensus that the panel presentations were a productive use of time. In addition, Commissioners particularly liked the Legislative Updates and the Commissioner Announcement time. It was suggested that all Hunger Commission business be taken care of before the panel discussion, and that there be time to formulate some “next steps” in response to issues raised by the panel presentations.

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