When I reported on the Cedar Rapids group, I reported how excited we all were about our upcoming ice cream social. I also reported that we would be collecting money for a memorial for John and Polly Ely for RESULTS Microcredit. Paul from Minneapolis knew the Elys, and he is sending money for the memorial. Also Lois from Baltimore wants to contribute.
The Baltimore group is hosting a healthcare forum Sunday afternoon. They have invited local doctors to speak and expect about 50 people. I wonder if we could think about a forum in Cedar Rapids -- not necessarily on healthcare. Perhaps on the world food crisis or some other issue. Ideas escape me right now. Something to think about?
Thursday, May 29, 2008
Global Call May 28
The Supplemental Bill is going to conference committee because the Senate version is virtually unrecognizeable compared to the version the House passed.
PEPFAR is still being held up in the Senate by seven Republicans. Efforts are underway to work with "reasonable" Republican Senators to stop this block. Grassley is not on the list of Senators targeted for this effort.
Paul Farmer is going to be on the conference call June 14. According to the Harvard Medical School website, "Medical anthropologist and physician Paul Farmer is a founding director of Partners In Health, an international charity organization that provides direct health care services and undertakes research and advocacy activities on behalf of those who are sick and living in poverty. Dr. Farmer’s work draws primarily on active clinical practice (he is an attending physician in infectious diseases and chief of the Division of Social Medicine and Health Inequalities at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) in Boston, and medical director of a charity hospital, the Clinique Bon Sauveur, in rural Haiti) and focuses on diseases that disproportionately afflict the poor. Along with his colleagues at BWH, in the Program in Infectious Disease and Social Change at Harvard Medical School, and in Haiti, Peru, and Russia, Dr. Farmer has pioneered novel, community-based treatment strategies for AIDS and tuberculosis (including multidrug-resistant tuberculosis). Dr. Farmer and his colleagues have successfully challenged the policymakers and critics who claim that quality health care is impossible to deliver in resource-poor settings."
PEPFAR is still being held up in the Senate by seven Republicans. Efforts are underway to work with "reasonable" Republican Senators to stop this block. Grassley is not on the list of Senators targeted for this effort.
Paul Farmer is going to be on the conference call June 14. According to the Harvard Medical School website, "Medical anthropologist and physician Paul Farmer is a founding director of Partners In Health, an international charity organization that provides direct health care services and undertakes research and advocacy activities on behalf of those who are sick and living in poverty. Dr. Farmer’s work draws primarily on active clinical practice (he is an attending physician in infectious diseases and chief of the Division of Social Medicine and Health Inequalities at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) in Boston, and medical director of a charity hospital, the Clinique Bon Sauveur, in rural Haiti) and focuses on diseases that disproportionately afflict the poor. Along with his colleagues at BWH, in the Program in Infectious Disease and Social Change at Harvard Medical School, and in Haiti, Peru, and Russia, Dr. Farmer has pioneered novel, community-based treatment strategies for AIDS and tuberculosis (including multidrug-resistant tuberculosis). Dr. Farmer and his colleagues have successfully challenged the policymakers and critics who claim that quality health care is impossible to deliver in resource-poor settings."
Farm Bill Online Article
Mixed Reactions to U.S. Farm Bill
Caitlin G. JohnsonOneWorld US
Fri., May. 23, 2008
WASHINGTON, May 22 (OneWorld) - The $300 billion U.S. Farm Bill, which is expected to be passed into law despite this week's veto by President George W. Bush, is getting high marks from advocates of U.S. food and nutrition programs but was blasted by those concerned about the global poor and giveaways to the already rich.
The legislation that sets laws and spending guidelines for a range of nutritional and agricultural programs doesn't usually attract much public notice when it comes up for reauthorization every five years. This year, however, may be different. Congress passed the bill with a bipartisan majority big enough to reverse Wednesday's veto by President Bush -- marking only the second time a veto of his would be overturned. Then a procedural mistake was uncovered, meaning the bill will likely be passed in Congress and vetoed again in the coming days before the Senate and House of Representatives make their final votes to enact the legislation.
But as the political maneuvering continues in Washington, advocates and others around the country are vocally calling attention to what they see as bill's pros and cons: a significant increase in domestic nutrition funding on one hand; big subsidies for "mega-farms" and worrisome foreign food aid rules on the other.
Strengthening Food Programs at Home
Anti-poverty advocates praise the bill for adding more than $10 billion over 10 years to key domestic nutrition programs, including free fruits and vegetable snacks in schools with high shares of low-income students and the Food Stamp program, which is expected to reach a record 28 million enrollees this year.
The bill also adjusts food stamp benefits and tax-time deductions to keep pace with rising prices and allows families to deduct more child care expenses from their income -- a move that will mean an average of nearly $500 a year more in food stamps for some 100,000 households, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a policy analysis organization.
"As a package, this is the most significant set of improvements in the Food Stamp Program in nearly 15 years," Stacy Dean, director of food assistance policy for the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, told One World. Results, a grassroots citizens lobby organization, called the bill "an important first step toward the goal of ending hunger in America."
Diane John-Smith who lives in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, turned to food stamps when she was unemployed for two years. She says she had to spend down her 401K retirement fund in order to be eligible for food stamps. Since 1986, the food stamp asset limits have remained $2,000 for most households -- meaning anyone with savings, a car, or other assets greater than that amount is generally ineligible for enrollment. The new Farm Bill "unfreezes" those limits by indexing them to inflation, so they will not decrease in real value each year.
John-Smith says it is about time the food stamp program got an update and more funding. "I am just so gratified [by the increase in funds]. $10 billion over ten years is significant and it's going to make a difference for a lot of people."
Concern Over "Mega-Farm" Subsidies and Foreign Aid Rules
At the same time, some aid organizations are criticizing the bill for failing to fix what they call a "broken" system of U.S. food aid abroad and increasing subsidies to wealthy farmers at home, at the expense of smaller farmers. "Although we, too, cheer the increases for programs for nutrition, Congress failed to deliver any serious reform [on farm policy and food aid]," Laura Rusu, a spokesperson for Oxfam America, told OneWorld.
"The current subsidy system does little to protect family farmers in the U.S. or alleviate problems in rural America. Taxpayers actually provide the funds that enable the biggest producers to gobble up smaller farms, driving land prices up and making it difficult for family farmers to afford to stay in business, and nearly impossibly for beginning farmers just starting out," she added. According to Oxfam, the largest 10 percent of producers receive about 75 percent of the $20 billion in U.S. commodity subsidies each year.
Leo Tammi, a sheep and livestock farmer in Mount Sidney, Virginia, says he's pleased that the bill adds money for nutrition and conservation, but is "more than a little disappointed that there wasn't the kind of reform in crop subsidy payments that many of us were hoping for." "I think most taxpayers wonder why we need to subsidize the upper-income mega-farms that will continue to be receiving the subsidies," he told OneWorld.
Oxfam and its allies -- including national groups such as the Environmental Working Group, the Center for Rural Affairs, Citizens Against Government Waste, and the Episcopal Church -- also fault the bill for failing to shift U.S. food aid policy away from an emphasis on U.S.-grown commodities to offering more cash assistance that would enable countries to buy more quickly and directly from local sources. Such a move, they say, would make U.S. assistance abroad much more efficient and support local industries in those countries at the same time, helping break the long-term cycle of poverty.
For some groups that support the domestic provisions -- which make up two thirds of the Farm Bill's focus -- the commodity subsidy provisions made it a difficult decision to support the bill. "As pleased as we are with the nutrition title, we are as equally disappointed in Congress' failure to enact meaningful commodity reform," Jos Linn, Results' domestic outreach organizer, told OneWorld.
"To make only cosmetic changes to a system that continues to reward rich farms at the expense of struggling farmers is inexcusable. Commodity supports also exacerbate world poverty through their trade-distorting effects and strain relations with our trade allies."
Linn was referring to the phenomenon that allows U.S. farmers to sell their goods abroad at excessively low prices because the subsidies provided by U.S. taxpayers make up the difference in revenue. This drives down prices -- and incomes -- for farmers around the world, and creates particular hardship for those in Africa and other parts of the world where vast majorities of the population depend on income from farming. "Congress chose the easy way out," added Linn, "and we all will have to pay for it."
In a statement quoted by the Food Research and Action Center, Senator Harry Reid (D-NV) said the bill was the result of necessary compromise. "This bill has reform in it. Could we have done more? Perhaps, but had we done more, we would not have gotten a bill. What did we get as a result of the compromises made? We got nutrition. What a wonderful thing. We got food stamps," Reid is quoted as saying.
Before his veto, Bush called the bill "bloated" and costly. In a May 13 statement, the administration criticized the bill for failing "to reform subsidies to multimillionaire farmers at a time of high farm income and rising grocery prices."
Still Time for 'Tweaks'
Congress is expected to vote to override the veto, since the bill originally passed both houses with more than the two-thirds majority needed to do so. "There's still time for Congress to tweak the bill for reform while retaining the gains made on the nutrition front," said Oxfam's Laura Rusu. "A lot of Americans haven't paid attention to the Farm Bill debate, undoubtedly thinking, 'I'm not a farmer, this isn't for me.' But if you care about where your food comes from, where your taxpayer dollars go, and how we hurt or help poor people, you should care about the Farm Bill," she said.
Caitlin G. JohnsonOneWorld US
Fri., May. 23, 2008
WASHINGTON, May 22 (OneWorld) - The $300 billion U.S. Farm Bill, which is expected to be passed into law despite this week's veto by President George W. Bush, is getting high marks from advocates of U.S. food and nutrition programs but was blasted by those concerned about the global poor and giveaways to the already rich.
The legislation that sets laws and spending guidelines for a range of nutritional and agricultural programs doesn't usually attract much public notice when it comes up for reauthorization every five years. This year, however, may be different. Congress passed the bill with a bipartisan majority big enough to reverse Wednesday's veto by President Bush -- marking only the second time a veto of his would be overturned. Then a procedural mistake was uncovered, meaning the bill will likely be passed in Congress and vetoed again in the coming days before the Senate and House of Representatives make their final votes to enact the legislation.
But as the political maneuvering continues in Washington, advocates and others around the country are vocally calling attention to what they see as bill's pros and cons: a significant increase in domestic nutrition funding on one hand; big subsidies for "mega-farms" and worrisome foreign food aid rules on the other.
Strengthening Food Programs at Home
Anti-poverty advocates praise the bill for adding more than $10 billion over 10 years to key domestic nutrition programs, including free fruits and vegetable snacks in schools with high shares of low-income students and the Food Stamp program, which is expected to reach a record 28 million enrollees this year.
The bill also adjusts food stamp benefits and tax-time deductions to keep pace with rising prices and allows families to deduct more child care expenses from their income -- a move that will mean an average of nearly $500 a year more in food stamps for some 100,000 households, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a policy analysis organization.
"As a package, this is the most significant set of improvements in the Food Stamp Program in nearly 15 years," Stacy Dean, director of food assistance policy for the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, told One World. Results, a grassroots citizens lobby organization, called the bill "an important first step toward the goal of ending hunger in America."
Diane John-Smith who lives in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, turned to food stamps when she was unemployed for two years. She says she had to spend down her 401K retirement fund in order to be eligible for food stamps. Since 1986, the food stamp asset limits have remained $2,000 for most households -- meaning anyone with savings, a car, or other assets greater than that amount is generally ineligible for enrollment. The new Farm Bill "unfreezes" those limits by indexing them to inflation, so they will not decrease in real value each year.
John-Smith says it is about time the food stamp program got an update and more funding. "I am just so gratified [by the increase in funds]. $10 billion over ten years is significant and it's going to make a difference for a lot of people."
Concern Over "Mega-Farm" Subsidies and Foreign Aid Rules
At the same time, some aid organizations are criticizing the bill for failing to fix what they call a "broken" system of U.S. food aid abroad and increasing subsidies to wealthy farmers at home, at the expense of smaller farmers. "Although we, too, cheer the increases for programs for nutrition, Congress failed to deliver any serious reform [on farm policy and food aid]," Laura Rusu, a spokesperson for Oxfam America, told OneWorld.
"The current subsidy system does little to protect family farmers in the U.S. or alleviate problems in rural America. Taxpayers actually provide the funds that enable the biggest producers to gobble up smaller farms, driving land prices up and making it difficult for family farmers to afford to stay in business, and nearly impossibly for beginning farmers just starting out," she added. According to Oxfam, the largest 10 percent of producers receive about 75 percent of the $20 billion in U.S. commodity subsidies each year.
Leo Tammi, a sheep and livestock farmer in Mount Sidney, Virginia, says he's pleased that the bill adds money for nutrition and conservation, but is "more than a little disappointed that there wasn't the kind of reform in crop subsidy payments that many of us were hoping for." "I think most taxpayers wonder why we need to subsidize the upper-income mega-farms that will continue to be receiving the subsidies," he told OneWorld.
Oxfam and its allies -- including national groups such as the Environmental Working Group, the Center for Rural Affairs, Citizens Against Government Waste, and the Episcopal Church -- also fault the bill for failing to shift U.S. food aid policy away from an emphasis on U.S.-grown commodities to offering more cash assistance that would enable countries to buy more quickly and directly from local sources. Such a move, they say, would make U.S. assistance abroad much more efficient and support local industries in those countries at the same time, helping break the long-term cycle of poverty.
For some groups that support the domestic provisions -- which make up two thirds of the Farm Bill's focus -- the commodity subsidy provisions made it a difficult decision to support the bill. "As pleased as we are with the nutrition title, we are as equally disappointed in Congress' failure to enact meaningful commodity reform," Jos Linn, Results' domestic outreach organizer, told OneWorld.
"To make only cosmetic changes to a system that continues to reward rich farms at the expense of struggling farmers is inexcusable. Commodity supports also exacerbate world poverty through their trade-distorting effects and strain relations with our trade allies."
Linn was referring to the phenomenon that allows U.S. farmers to sell their goods abroad at excessively low prices because the subsidies provided by U.S. taxpayers make up the difference in revenue. This drives down prices -- and incomes -- for farmers around the world, and creates particular hardship for those in Africa and other parts of the world where vast majorities of the population depend on income from farming. "Congress chose the easy way out," added Linn, "and we all will have to pay for it."
In a statement quoted by the Food Research and Action Center, Senator Harry Reid (D-NV) said the bill was the result of necessary compromise. "This bill has reform in it. Could we have done more? Perhaps, but had we done more, we would not have gotten a bill. What did we get as a result of the compromises made? We got nutrition. What a wonderful thing. We got food stamps," Reid is quoted as saying.
Before his veto, Bush called the bill "bloated" and costly. In a May 13 statement, the administration criticized the bill for failing "to reform subsidies to multimillionaire farmers at a time of high farm income and rising grocery prices."
Still Time for 'Tweaks'
Congress is expected to vote to override the veto, since the bill originally passed both houses with more than the two-thirds majority needed to do so. "There's still time for Congress to tweak the bill for reform while retaining the gains made on the nutrition front," said Oxfam's Laura Rusu. "A lot of Americans haven't paid attention to the Farm Bill debate, undoubtedly thinking, 'I'm not a farmer, this isn't for me.' But if you care about where your food comes from, where your taxpayer dollars go, and how we hurt or help poor people, you should care about the Farm Bill," she said.
Saturday, May 24, 2008
RESULTS Diversity Task Force Strategies and Goals
Strategies:
A) Determine contact person in the minority community.B) Set up a meeting with the contact person to cover:
1) This is RESULTS
a) personal story
b) RESULTS activities locally and nationally
c) RESULTS campaigns for 2008
2) Intent of Diversity Task Force
a) Cedar Rapids is a pilot city
b) The identified minority communities are: African-American, Hindu-American, Hispanic, Jewish, Muslim-American, Native American
c) This community can join an existing RESULTS group or four members can function as a group within a Cedar Rapids coalition. We will listen to conference calls together, do fundraisers together, do outreach meetings together; we can hold second monthly meeting separately in order to focus on public or political education.
3) What I need from you (the contact person):
a) What do I need to know about your community? citizenship, culture, economics, language, literacy, transportation
b) Can you help me set up an informational meeting? Identify people who might be interested, invite the wider community
C) Hold informational meeting
1) Use Compassion and Empowerment presentation; Everyday Heroes DVD; testimonial from RESULTS activist; depending on literacy and citizenship of group, write letters to MoC or LTEs.
2) Collect contact information from interested people.
3) Set up training sessions.
Goals:
Native American community
Have meeting with contact by June 2008; 1 new member.
Hispanic community
Have meeting with contact by end of June 2008; do informational meeting by end of July 2008; 3 new members in training by end of August 2008.
Muslim-American community
Have meeting with contact by end of July 2008; do informational meeting by end of August 2008; 5 new members in training by end of September 2008.
Jewish community
Have meeting with contact by end of August 2008; do informational meeting by end of September 2008; 5 new members in training by end of October 2008.
Hindu-American community
Have meeting with contact by end of September 2008; do informational meeting by end of October 2008; 5 new members in training by end of November 2008.
African-American community
Establish contact by end of June 2008; meet with contact by end of October 2008; do informational meeting by end of November 2008; 5 new members in training by end of January 2009.
A) Determine contact person in the minority community.B) Set up a meeting with the contact person to cover:
1) This is RESULTS
a) personal story
b) RESULTS activities locally and nationally
c) RESULTS campaigns for 2008
2) Intent of Diversity Task Force
a) Cedar Rapids is a pilot city
b) The identified minority communities are: African-American, Hindu-American, Hispanic, Jewish, Muslim-American, Native American
c) This community can join an existing RESULTS group or four members can function as a group within a Cedar Rapids coalition. We will listen to conference calls together, do fundraisers together, do outreach meetings together; we can hold second monthly meeting separately in order to focus on public or political education.
3) What I need from you (the contact person):
a) What do I need to know about your community? citizenship, culture, economics, language, literacy, transportation
b) Can you help me set up an informational meeting? Identify people who might be interested, invite the wider community
C) Hold informational meeting
1) Use Compassion and Empowerment presentation; Everyday Heroes DVD; testimonial from RESULTS activist; depending on literacy and citizenship of group, write letters to MoC or LTEs.
2) Collect contact information from interested people.
3) Set up training sessions.
Goals:
Native American community
Have meeting with contact by June 2008; 1 new member.
Hispanic community
Have meeting with contact by end of June 2008; do informational meeting by end of July 2008; 3 new members in training by end of August 2008.
Muslim-American community
Have meeting with contact by end of July 2008; do informational meeting by end of August 2008; 5 new members in training by end of September 2008.
Jewish community
Have meeting with contact by end of August 2008; do informational meeting by end of September 2008; 5 new members in training by end of October 2008.
Hindu-American community
Have meeting with contact by end of September 2008; do informational meeting by end of October 2008; 5 new members in training by end of November 2008.
African-American community
Establish contact by end of June 2008; meet with contact by end of October 2008; do informational meeting by end of November 2008; 5 new members in training by end of January 2009.
Thursday, May 22, 2008
Leslee's Op-Ed Published May 18
Better world through education
I’ve had the opportunity this school year of volunteering in my daughter’s kindergarten class. No, not as a parent of a kindergarten child, but as the parent of the teacher. As I’ve worked with these beautiful children, I’ve witnessed their skills grow from knowing a only few letters and sounds to reading books. What pride they have when they finish reading and get to take the books home to read to their parents. Seeing these 5- and 6-yearolds and their first public school experiences makes me wonder what they will choose for careers as adults. They will learn much over the course of their next 12 years in school. Lucky children — attaining an education is their fundamental right. Unfortunately, education as a fundamental right is not the case in many developing countries of the world. As a member of RESULTS, a grass-roots advocacy organization committed to ending hunger and poverty, I have learned that education in developing countries is the most effective way to break the cycle of poverty. However, consider: . More than 72 million primary (elementary) school children around the world are not in school; 226 million do not have access to secondary education. . There are many reasons why children do not attend school: school fees, child labor, poor quality schooling, health crises such as HIV/ AIDS, discrimination and conflict. . Nearly 70 percent of the world’s out-of-school children live in South/West Asia and sub-Saharan Africa. . Studies find that 100 million girls enrolled in school will drop out before completing primary schooling often because of their inability to pay fees or because they are needed to take care of their household where a parent is dying of AIDS. . Less than 10 percent of children with disabilities are in school. . The ability to attend school is only the first challenge. In some places, there may be as many as 150 children in each classroom and not enough teachers or supplies. In 2000, 189 countries, including the United States, agreed to support the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals for reducing global poverty by 2015. One of the eight goals includes universal access to education and equal access among boys and girls. The United States’ commitment is falling far short of what was pledged. In 2006, we gave a total of $477 million to education in developing countries — the approximate cost of building just 17 U.S. high schools. The Education for All Act is bipartisan legislation that would authorize an initial $1 billion in global education funding for this year, scaling up to $3 billion by 2012. Sens. Chuck Grassley and Tom Harkin and Rep. David Loebsack — please co-sponsor this act. We’re all better off when the children of the world are educated.
Leslee Sandberg of Cedar Rapids is a retired longtime educator and member of the Cedar Rapids RESULTS group.
Leslee's Op-Ed Published May 18
Better world through education
I’ve had the opportunity this school year of volunteering in my daughter’s kindergarten class. No, not as a parent of a kindergarten child, but as the parent of the teacher. As I’ve worked with these beautiful children, I’ve witnessed their skills grow from knowing a only few letters and sounds to reading books. What pride they have when they finish reading and get to take the books home to read to their parents. Seeing these 5- and 6-yearolds and their first public school experiences makes me wonder what they will choose for careers as adults. They will learn much over the course of their next 12 years in school. Lucky children — attaining an education is their fundamental right. Unfortunately, education as a fundamental right is not the case in many developing countries of the world. As a member of RESULTS, a grass-roots advocacy organization committed to ending hunger and poverty, I have learned that education in developing countries is the most effective way to break the cycle of poverty. However, consider: . More than 72 million primary (elementary) school children around the world are not in school; 226 million do not have access to secondary education. . There are many reasons why children do not attend school: school fees, child labor, poor quality schooling, health crises such as HIV/ AIDS, discrimination and conflict. . Nearly 70 percent of the world’s out-of-school children live in South/West Asia and sub-Saharan Africa. . Studies find that 100 million girls enrolled in school will drop out before completing primary schooling often because of their inability to pay fees or because they are needed to take care of their household where a parent is dying of AIDS. . Less than 10 percent of children with disabilities are in school. . The ability to attend school is only the first challenge. In some places, there may be as many as 150 children in each classroom and not enough teachers or supplies. In 2000, 189 countries, including the United States, agreed to support the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals for reducing global poverty by 2015. One of the eight goals includes universal access to education and equal access among boys and girls. The United States’ commitment is falling far short of what was pledged. In 2006, we gave a total of $477 million to education in developing countries — the approximate cost of building just 17 U.S. high schools. The Education for All Act is bipartisan legislation that would authorize an initial $1 billion in global education funding for this year, scaling up to $3 billion by 2012. Sens. Chuck Grassley and Tom Harkin and Rep. David Loebsack — please co-sponsor this act. We’re all better off when the children of the world are educated.
Leslee Sandberg of Cedar Rapids is a retired longtime educator and member of the Cedar Rapids RESULTS group.
Polly's Funeral
I talked to Jos about coming to Cedar Rapids to speak at Polly service. He said he really didn't know her that well and felt pretty uncomfortable saying anything. So I told him I would be glad to talk about what Polly did for RESULTS.
Domestic call May 22
There were four of us on the call when Jos Linn joined to talk about the Farm Bill. Because of a clerical error in the House Ag Committee, 35 pages of the Farm Bill were not sent to the President. The House had voted to override the veto and didn't lose any votes compared to the original vote on the Farm Bill. Because of the error, the House will have to revote today on the bill and the Senate will revote today or tomorrow. Then the President will veto it, and both chambers will vote to override. Jos isn't worried. He says there's enough of a margin for an override.
I was interviewed yesterday by a web reporter on my Food Stamps experience. She took pause several times during our conversation. I think she was moved.
I was interviewed yesterday by a web reporter on my Food Stamps experience. She took pause several times during our conversation. I think she was moved.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
