Food Stamp Challenge...

JFS Executive Director Beth Schwartz is taking the challenge. Follow the blog

Download the follow up article about Beth's experience

In 2011, Fighting Poverty with Faith is "Working Together to End Hunger." We enlist the moral authority and organizing power of the coordinated faith community to move individuals and communities to action and advocate for clear, immediate policy solutions to address the root causes of poverty.

Join us today by participating in the Food Stamp Challenge - a challenge to live for 1 week on the average food stamp allotment. Leaders and community members across the nation are taking the Food Stamp Challenge in order to help them better understand how the program works on a personal level and to highlight the continued need for and importance of feeding programs to alleviate hunger in the United States.

For one week, from Thursday, October 27 through Thursday, November 3*, participants will live on the nationwide average food stamp benefit. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which is responsible for administering the Food Stamp Program, the nationwide average monthly benefit in 2010 was $133.79, approximately $4.50 a day or $1.50 a meal.

Why a Food Stamp Challenge? The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP (aka Food Stamps), currently helps nearly 45 million low-income people purchase food for their families – that’s 1 in 7 Americans. The program is designed as a safety net to help ensure that people have access to food during difficult times, with the majority of people leaving the program within nine months. More than half of food stamp recipients are children and eight percent are over 60 years of age.

Recently, SNAP and similar feeding programs have been under attack; now is the time to say "enough." There should not be hunger in the United States, and we must ensure the SNAP program, and similar feeding programs, are protected during the budgeting process and the re-authorization of the Farm Bill in 2012.

*If you cannot participate exactly on these dates, we encourage you to schedule your Food Stamp Challenge to overlap with at least 1 day of the 2011 Fighting Poverty with Faith mobilization, which runs from Thursday, October 27 through Sunday, November 6.

The link below will connect you a national registry. 

We also would love to connect with others in our community who are meeting the challenge. Please email us or use the online contact form to let us know of your participation.