By Michael Bernaschina, Staff Writer
Earlier this week on Nov. 6, the Johnson Center for Civic Engagement held a Let’s Talk discussion on hunger and poverty.
The event took place at 11:30 a.m. Monday morning in the meeting rooms in the Degenstein Campus Center, and featured a guest speaker, Joanne Troutman, CEO and president of the Greater Susquehanna Valley United Way.
In the interactive discussion, Troutman and those present discussed hunger and poverty, not only within the area but also within the lives of those present, as well as what can and has been done to combat it.
“I’m not the world’s leading expert on poverty and hunger, but what I do know is our community,” Troutman said.
Something Troutman made a point to emphasize in the discussion was the idea of hunger versus food insecurity, what both of those mean, and what the distinction between the two is.
According to Troutman, a large part of it is uncertainty, and not “Knowing when your next meal is going to be.”
“Insecurity really comes in where families have food but not enough of it,” she added.
Another major topic of discussion that came up was SNAP, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, and food stamps, namely the negative stigmas that surround them.
“What’s the stigma?” She asked. “‘They just need to get a job.’”
However, the reality of the issue is much more complicated than that, Troutman said.
“The living wage here in the community, for single moms with two kids is about $22 an hour,” she said before posing a question to the audience. “What kind of job do you need to make $22 dollars an hour?”
The stigma against food stamps has had other negative repercussions, including discouraging people from applying for them at all, Troutman said.
“Food stamps carry a certain stigma,” she said. “We see a lot of families who might qualify for food stamps or food assistance who don’t apply because of the stigma.”
Troutman also drew on her own personal experiences, and the struggles she faced while growing up to further illustrate the problem.
“My first job out of college I made $17,000 a year, so I figured out pretty quickly that, with debt load, I couldn’t con- tinue to work in a job where I made $17,000,” she said.
Next week on November 13 at 7 p.m., the JCCE will be hosting another event, the annual Hunger Banquet.The purpose of the event is to increase community knowledge of global crises,notice injustices, and influence policies that perpetuate poverty by working in an interactive experience.
