Hi All,

This morning, I sat in on a panel discussion at CUNY Graduate Center about the benefits of offering free breakfast and lunch to school children. The NYC Food Policy Center at Hunter College sponsored the program, and they were looking at a NYC pilot program in its second year, where all “stand alone” middle schools have been providing free breakfast and lunch to all of their students. The purpose of this panel, was to look at the program, and to assess if it is working, and what can be done better. The discussions and statistics around poverty, hunger, and food insecurity among the majority of NYC public school children was shocking and heartbreaking. Normally, in order to qualify for the free lunch program at school, a family of 3 can not earn more than $37,000. With the cost of living in New York, it is impossible to make ends meet with that. So you can imagine, how many kids need the assistance but don’t qualify because their family might be making $40,000 or more, yet they are still struggling, especially if they have more than one child needing lunch. And for many of these kids, the food they get at school, is the only food they are getting. Yet there is another problem that comes along with the free lunch, and that is the stigma associated with it. Many kids don’t want to participate in the program, because they don’t want the other kids to know that they need the help. The free Breakfast and Lunch Program removes that issue completely, and opens the door for more opportunity to share meals in a more family friendly environment. There is still lots of work to be done, but I think we are going in the right direction to provide a Universal Free Breakfast and Lunch Program to the public school children of this country.

This week on the Progressive Radio Network, I have invited Earl Fultz to join me. Earl is the 92 year old Founder and CEO of “cHarissa”, a small, artisanal food company, that has introduced the authentic flavor of a favorite Morocco recipe, adjusted for the American palate. It’s a great story about love and culinary history. He will be joined by Jeri Woodhouse, the Executive VP and Founder of “A Taste of the North Fork.”             I hope you can join us.

Remember, my show is recorded live, every Thursday, from 10-11 am, EST.  To tune in, navigate to PRN.fm and click the “Listen Live” button on the left. Also try downloading the PRN mobile app, and take the station with you wherever you go! If you want to call in during the show with any questions for me or my guest, the call in number is 888-874-4888.

If you can’t tune in at that time, you can listen to the show in the PRN archives, or on my website, or through iTunes. Please “like” iEat Green’s Facebook page and feel free to rate the show and leave comments on iTunes and on my website. Thank you all for your support.

With love and gratitude,

Bhavani