Gazette-Times reporter

Oregon may no longer be the hungriest state in the nation, but low wages, high housing costs and social service agencies stretched to their limits combine to make this a difficult place for many people to live.

Patti Whitney-Wise, executive director of the Oregon Hunger Relief Task Force, spent an hour Monday night at the Corvallis-Benton County Public Library explaining how Oregon got into this "state of hunger" and how individuals and organizations are pushing for changes at the state level to make life better.

In the 1970s, a family of three with one adult working a full-time minimum wage job could exist above the poverty line. But the 1980s saw dramatic changes to the social support system, from an 80 percent cut in federally subsidized housing to a 35 percent reduction to food stamp and child nutrition programs.

Welfare reform in 1996 caused additional cuts, and many families previously qualifying for welfare were cut off, pushing them into low wage jobs that didn't pay the bills. The way the poverty level is calculated, even those far above the mark are still struggling to feed their families.

"Hunger is the canary in the mine shaft," Whitney-Wise said. "If a family doesn't pay rent, they're evicted, or if they don't pay their power bill, the electricity is shut off."

Because of these other demands, poor families consider the food budget the only flexible item, meaning they can choose to go without food, but they can't choose to not pay the rent.

Many Oregon families are food insecure, that is, they don't know where their next meal is coming from. Almost 23 percent of children in Oregon are considered food insecure, and even when those children are getting fed, it's often not food that is nutritious enough to help them grow and thrive, Whitney-Wise said.

In Oregon, 20 percent of families with an income of between $16,000 and $30,000 are food insecure, contrasted with the national average of 13 percent. That is mainly because of the high cost of living in the state.

"Housing costs really have outstripped wages," she said.

In addition, utility costs have skyrocketed. Home oil is up 93 percent, natural gas is up 53 percent, and yet the median income is only up 10 percent.

Healthcare costs, childcare costs and other factors all mean that every bit of income is being stretched to its limit.

One way to help combat these issues, Whitney-Wise said, is to provide outreach and education to families who don't realize they're eligible for food stamps. At least 44 percent of those qualified to receive food stamps in Benton County do not utilize that service, and that may be because they don't realize they're qualified.

More after-school meal programs, breakfast programs and other child nutrition options are helping to support children in need, which in turn improves behaviors and test scores at schools. The Oregon Hunger Relief Task Force is supporting a number of legislative actions at the state level which could increase the support given to families in need.

Among those are bills aimed at family economic stability, that is, addressing the root problems of poverty rather than focusing on the bandage effects of food banks and other services, although those are still very necessary. Legislators will be looking at an increase in affordable housing funding, creating more support for disabled Oregonians, expanding healthcare coverage to every child in Oregon and expanding the refundable earned income tax credit so that lower wage workers can keep more of their money for bills.

On the net

For more information on the Oregon Hunger Relief Task Force, go to www.oregonhunger.org. To find out if you are qualified to receive food stamps, call 800-723-3638.