While our city ‘Leaders’ and supposed ‘Progressives‘ talk about increasing regressive taxes in Sioux Falls to build a $169 million dollar playground, WORKING people can’t even afford to feed their families;
South Dakota’s working poor slipping into food insecurity is a phenomenon emergency food agency heads already have recognized.
“We are seeing more people coming in where one or both parents have a job,” says Tamera Jerke-Liesinger, executive director of The Banquet. The Banquet fed notably more people in 2009 than previously.
The Feeding America report suggests 36 percent of households requiring emergency food aid have at least one employed adult. But 74 percent of those families have incomes below the federal poverty level. About one-third of those families reported having to choose between buying food or paying for utilities or housing, and 25 percent had to choose between buying food or medicine or food or transportation.
“Until the early 1980s, food stamps provided most of people’s food needs. But during the 1980s, so much of that public safety net kind of unraveled,” says Hugh Grogan, Minnehaha County human services director.
“It used to be there was almost no way you would not qualify for food stamps if you were poor,” Grogan says. “Now there are lots of ways.”
Also, food stamps don’t go as far as they used to, according to Davidson. “With bigger families, food stamps just aren’t enough,” she says.
Gassen said the numbers in the Feeding America report on the working poor “told a unique story about South Dakota. People are reaching out for hope. They’re not doing nothing, trying to get free food.”
I started thinking about this the other day. Like I mentioned previously, taking $50 million out of the economy by giving it to the city in the form of new taxes actually takes money away from local businesses, which is very BAD for the economy. The irony of all this is that the Events Center Task Force has said that the EC would have a $52 million dollar impact on the city each year. So if you subtract those numbers, it seems building the EC would have only a $2 million dollar impact each year. Whoo-Hoo! What are we waiting for, we are losing money!!!!!! Let’s get it built!