The 2009 maximum food stamp benefit has been set at $588 per month for a family of four, based on the June 2008 cost of the Thrifty Food Plan.

Between June and October 2008, the cost of the Thrifty Food Plan rose to $606, 3.1 percent more than the maximum benefit in
the first month of FY 2009.

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Rock and Wrap It Up!, the national, independent anti-poverty think tank based in New York, announced today that the Federal Food Donation Act of 2008 has become Public Law 1109-247. Rock and Wrap It Up! is non-profit and nonpartisan, an organization devoted to developing and implementing innovative greening solutions to the pressing issues of hunger and poverty in America. President George W.

StarTribune.com
Editorial: State shouldn’t spurn federal aid

December 3, 2008

Minnesotans will hear today what many Americans have already been told: the recession is taking a huge bite out of state government operating revenues.

Canadian Pacific is asking Americans to help feed the celebration in support of the Holiday Train’s 10th anniversary by increasing their donations at events and by sharing their Holiday Train memories from the past and present on the internet.

Fueled by rising unemployment and food prices, the number of Americans on food stamps is poised to exceed 30 million for the first time this month, surpassing the historic high set in 2005 after Hurricane Katrina.

The figures will put the spotlight on hunger when Congress begins deliberations on a new economic stimulus package, said legislators and anti-hunger advocates, predicting that any sti

Some 691,000 children went hungry in America sometime in 2007, while close to one in eight Americans struggled to feed themselves adequately even before this year’s sharp economic downturn, the Agriculture Department reported Monday.

The department’s annual report on food security showed that during 2007 the number of children who suffered a substantial disruption in the amount of food they typ

It’s no surprise that during the first nine months of the year use at the 31 northeastern Minnesota and northwest Wisconsin food shelves served by Second Harvest Northern Lakes Food Bank had increased. In fact 22 percent more people are receiving assistance from Northland food shelves than a year ago.

That’s why the Alliance to End Hunger along with Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., and Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass., sent a letter to Obama last week signed by 116 members of Congress from both parties.

REBECCA MUSCARELLO had long worked as a secretary, so she never imagined that at age 35 she would be left with no choice but to take her two children to a food pantry to get groceries. But like a growing number of Americans whose jobs have evaporated in a shrinking economy, Ms. Muscarello ran out of money and then food.

NYTIMES

More than 29 million Americans are enrolled in the federal food stamp program. This is the highest enrollment in history, save for the period immediately following Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.