A Path from Unemployment to Serving People in Need

Sonia Rivera, far right, celebrated with her team after finishing the inaugural Walk Against Hunger in Bridgeport in April 2010. Team Sonia Rivera won third prize for team fundraising prizes for the Walk in Bridgeport.

This time last year, Sonia Rivera was unemployed. She lost her job in April 2009 after she was laid off as part of a national company’s efforts to cut costs and downsize. It was the first time since college that Sonia didn’t have a job.

For 16 years, Sonia was a traffic manager, managing more than a dozen employees and a fleet of eight to nine trucks a day that served the tri-state area. It was a job she loved and enjoyed doing.

But like many hundreds of thousands of workers, the poor economy forced Sonia’s company to cut jobs, driving about 30 workers to the unemployment lines.

Sonia took some time off for herself, but quickly started to look for a job in earnest. She said she was fortunate because her family, including then 10-year-old daughter Vanessa, had her husband’s income and her unemployment benefits to help them through the trying time.

Sonia, who initially didn’t know where the unemployment office in Bridgeport was located, started going to the Connecticut Department of Labor office on Lafayette Square to take as many classes as she could to improve her computer and job skills. She had not searched for a job since she graduated from college about 16 years ago.

“I was there every single day,” Sonia recalled. “I met a lot of wonderful people who were willing to help. Going to the unemployment office was so beneficial for me. The counselors there were so wonderful. They knew what I was going through and knew how to guide me.”

Sonia was the first to admit that her situation wasn’t as dire as others, who were only collecting $60 a week on unemployment. She said she was fortunate that she was able to collect the maximum benefit.

But after months of being unemployed, Sonia started to worry about what would happen to her family’s finances after the unemployment benefits ran out. She did all she could to find a job. She attended job and career fairs, networked with as many people as she could face-to-face as well as through social media.

It was a tough job market, Sonia said.

In the fall of 2009, Sonia learned about Connecticut Food Bank after watching “The Biggest Loser” television show on NBC. She realized that unlike before when she worked, she now had the time to give back to her community. She called Connecticut Food Bank to volunteer.

Sonia started doing office work for the Food Bank in October 2009. She came about once a week to the Food Bank to fold letters, stuff envelopes and help with some office tasks.

Then, as Connecticut Food Bank searched for a new Fairfield Warehouse Distribution Coordinator, Sonia’s story and resume got passed along to the administration at the Food Bank.

“I just got into the habit of sharing my story with everybody. I wanted to be open with people. This is who I am. This is my story,” Sonia said.

On Feb. 11, 2010, Sonia started at the Food Bank’s Fairfield warehouse. This month, she will be heading to Waterbury to manage the warehouse under an interim appointment.

She has since gone back to the unemployment office in Bridgeport to share her success story and give others hope that an opportunity may be just around the corner.

“Be positive. Don’t get into that “I-give-up-I-quit” attitude. Remain as positive as you can; surround yourself with positive people; look for all the resources available to you; and just get up and go,” Sonia said.

Posted by Gladys Alcedo, Communications Coordinator of Connecticut Food Bank

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Meatless Monday (Maybe) and Tuesday and Wednesday…

Editor’s Note: Below is a guest post from Elaine Piraino-Holevoet of PIROET Design, who initially posted the entry on her blog, called ontheroadtogreenness. The blog is a tale of one person’s lifelong journey to becoming a good person living a green lifestyle. It is also the story of the people she has met, the things she has tried, the places she has traveled, and the ideas she has encountered along the way. These are all recounted in the hope of getting others to join her on her quest to save the planet. The blog entry below is reprinted with permission.

Many who go without meat on Monday have made a conscious decision to do so—perhaps to improve their health or because they are concerned about climate change. Some are vegetarians or vegans and go without meat every day for ethical reasons. Whatever the motivation, it is a privilege when one can make the choice.

For too many others, actively choosing to “go meatless” is not a possibility. In order to feed their family, or to relieve their hunger, they will eat what is served at the soup kitchen or what comes in the donated bag of groceries, whether it is meat or vegetable, syrupy or salty, funny colored or natural, or tastes like it comes from a can. They will do this on Monday, on Tuesday, on Wednesday, and on all the other days. Some days they may not eat at all. As we observe Meatless Monday, let’s think for a moment about those who can’t choose to join us.

The recession is over according to the National Bureau of Economic Research. And I heard from a niece who works for a company which sells shipping supplies that new orders are on the rise. But even if the recession IS over, recovery will take a long while. The statistics for those living in poverty are way up. The August jobless rate in my state was 9.1 percent, and that figure does not include those who have given up looking for work.

Connecticut Food Bank, an organization I know very well, just sent me a solicitation reading:

“The severe effects of the economic crisis and high unemployment are still being felt. Many families with children are going hungry, and are desperately seeking emergency food assistance—some for the first time in their lives. Proud seniors in our communities are barely surviving on fixed incomes. They are unable to afford both their medicine and meals… Connecticut Food Bank distributes more than 16 million pounds of food a year to 650 food-assistance programs. These agencies are much-needed lifelines—providing groceries and hot meals to 300,000 hungry men, women and children. A successful Thanksgiving Appeal will go a long way toward fighting the problem of hunger here in Connecticut.”

Connecticut Food Bank is one of 200 food banks which are members of Feeding America, the nation’s largest food bank network. In its August newsletter, Connecticut Food Bank references a study released in July by Feeding America that reports 15.9 percent of Connecticut children under the age of 18 are hungry or at risk of hunger. More than 100,000 children in the state with the highest per capita income!

In less developed nations, scores of people are in dire straits daily, particularly when natural disasters strike. Oxfam is often a first responder to emergencies as the recent floods in Pakistan and the earthquakes in Haiti. There are many other groups working on hunger relief. I merely reference three I happen to know and trust.

Times may be tough. But if you are reading this post on a computer or a mobile device, chances are that you are able to take some action, even if it is a small one, to help alleviate hunger. In this season of harvest and plenty, let’s remember those less fortunate, in our country and around the world.

I often blog on food or food issues on Monday in support of Meatless Monday, one of several programs developed in the Healthy Monday project, founded in 2003 in association with Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Communications. Meatless Monday’s goal is “to help reduce meat consumption 15 percent in order to improve personal health and the health of our planet.”

Posted by Elaine Piraino-Holevoet of PIROET Design, a supporter of Connecticut Food Bank and designer of Connecticut Food Bank’s semiannual newsletter, Connecticut Food News

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Hurricane Recession Has Passed, But Devastation Lingers

When I heard the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) proclaim on Sept. 20 that the recession was over, my immediate, knee-jerk reaction was: “You’ve got to be kidding me!”

According to the NBER, a nonpartisan group of economists, the recession actually ended last year—June 2009.

Like many people, I want the recession to be over for both personal and professional reasons. But like many people who see everyday the human effects of the devastation of this so-called Great Recession I can’t help but utter disbelief in what economists are saying out loud.

Let’s not forget, five days before the NBER said the recession was over, the U.S. Census Bureau reported that more people are struggling with poverty—hitting the highest level recorded since 1994. And children felt the hardest poverty hit, with one child in five affected, according to The New York Times.

And on Thursday at our biennial Programs Conference, I met a volunteer from one of our food pantries who told me how she has been out of a job after being laid off and still can’t find new employment despite her best efforts.

How can someone say the recession is over? And it’s been over for more than a year?

Let me be clear, we at Connecticut Food Bank and our partner food-assistance programs already had tough enough jobs before the recession. This economic downturn—which The New York Times called the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression—just made it worse. So we would be the first to celebrate the end of the recession, but there’s nothing to celebrate.

After a week’s worth of reflection and hearing ongoing news about the recession as well as the hurricane season, I’ve come to understand the role of the economists at NBER.

The NBER economists, as far as I can tell, track the recessions like the weather service tracks a hurricane that may threaten our shores. The economists pinpoint the actual start of the recession based on certain conditions as the weather service watches the wind and weather patterns that may be developing along the Atlantic that could lead to a hurricane.

The NBER then follows the economic conditions that define a recession and when those conditions are no longer met, the economists can say the recession is over. It’s just like the weather service saying, after the winds and rains have dissipated, the hurricane has passed and we’re in the clear.

But we know all too well that when a hurricane makes landfall, being in the clear isn’t the end of our problems. We have to deal with the devastation and destruction left by the storm. Just look at how the Gulf to this day is still struggling with the effects of Hurricane Katrina five years later.

In its simplest sense, that’s what we’re seeing with the Great Recession.

If the recession is truly over, then we’re now facing the human devastation and community destruction it has left in its path. And as Warren Buffett told CNBC last week, it will take us a long time to get out of this mess.

We know this because we have heard from other economists that households experiencing the long-term unemployment or underemployment associated with this recession—the people who are now coming to the food banks, food pantries and soup kitchens—will not fully recover for at least 10 years beyond the turn-around of the economy.

That’s the reality that Connecticut’s anti-hunger advocates are facing. Our work, therefore, continues.

Posted by Gladys Alcedo, Communications Coordinator of Connecticut Food Bank

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On Labor Day, let’s remember the unemployed and underemployed

As we headed into the Labor Day weekend, The New York Times published a story about the latest unemployment figures initially titled “U.S. Lost Jobs in August, but Fewer Than Expected.”

Friday’s headline seemingly tried to soften the blow of a harsh truth. More people are still losing their jobs, but, hey, it’s not as much as we expected.

If you drill further down into the story you will find the number of unemployed people in the country jumped from 14.59 million in July to 14.86 million in August. By the end of the story, you learn about the people willing to take any job, even if it means taking a pay cut, just as long as they have a job.

That’s the underemployed. And their numbers have “reached historic highs” in Connecticut, the Hartford Business Journal reported.

The underemployed includes people who saw their full-time hours reduced to part-time because of the flagging economy, just like Henry’s parents. Read about the 11-year-old boy’s story, titled “Going Beyond the Employment Data,” on our website, www.ctfoodbank.org.

Henry’s family isn’t alone.

Connecticut—with its long-term unemployment rate as the fourth highest in the country—is seeing its underemployment rate reach 14 percent, “a historic high for the state,” the Hartford Business Journal said in its story.

And it’s not just happening in Connecticut, it’s happening all over. Check out The New York Times story about “New Job Means Lower Wages for Many.”

More and more of the underemployed are coming to our partner soup kitchens and food pantries seeking help for the first time. And they are walking through the doors “shell-shocked” and unaware of “how to navigate the waters of their current situation,” according to Cheryl Bedore, president of Master’s Manna of Wallingford.

Many of them don’t know what social service resources are available to help them. But they find us because they used to be on the giving end.

They never once thought for a second that they would be on the receiving end.

Posted by Gladys Alcedo, Communications Coordinator of Connecticut Food Bank

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