By Ashley Morace
Food insecurity amongst children and their families had been an ongoing social issue for decades. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, children and their families are more food insecure than ever before, and this epidemic is taking place right in your very own backyard.
A statistic provided by Project Bread, an organization that connects people and communities in Massachusetts to reliable sources of food while advocating for policies to make food more accessible, is that “Massachusetts has experienced the largest relative increase of food-insecure individuals in the nation due to COVID-19. And the highest increase of food-insecure children at 102%, according to the analysis by Feeding America.”
Another statistic provided by Feeding America, whose mission is to feed America’s hungry through a nationwide network of member food banks and engage our country in the fight to end hunger, is that “People in Massachusetts have estimated that they need $379,733,000 more per year to meet their food needs… and the average cost of a meal in Massachusetts is $3.63. That is roughly 104,609,642 meals and there are close to 7 million people living in Massachusetts.”
There are two bills currently being discussed regarding providing free universal school meals to school children across the state. The number of those two bills, SD519 and HD1161, is an act relative to universal school meals which have been filed by Senator DiDomenico and Representative Vargas.
The first bill, SD519, illustrates that all schools will be required to provide school lunch along with school breakfast to each attending student at no charge.
The second bill, HD1161, discusses the costs and funding that would be reimbursed through federal funds and who will be responsible for these costs if federal funding will not cover it.
If you would like further information regarding these two bills, please visit the website malegislature.gov and type in the bill identification number to read more about these bills, their presenters and cosponsors. Contact your state legislator and make a difference!
