The last time a U.S. president convened a serious examination of food insecurity was in 1978 under President Jimmy Carter. If Paule Pachter, the CEO of Long Island Cares, has any say, the next one will happen under the watch of President-Elect Joe Biden.
Pachter sent a proposal letter to Biden’s transition team last month, building upon a long association between his organization and federal-level examinations of food insecurity. Harry Chapin, the founder of Long Island Cares and a Grammy award-winning singer/songwriter, successfully led the creation of the 1978 presidential commission, only three years before he tragically died at age 38 in a car accident on the Long Island Expressway.
With the 40th anniversary of Chapin’s passing coming up in 2021, Pachter determined that another shot at a presidential commission was well timed. It would be a suitable commemoration of Chapin, while also taking advantage of the new Biden administration and increased public awareness of food insecurity due to the pandemic.
“It’s the right time to take a serious look on how to get a handle on this,” Pachter said.
At the time of the original commission, President-Elect Biden was a senator, marking another through line between then and now. In addition, Pachter is seeking to involve Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont who served on the first presidential commission as a young senator and now ranks first in seniority in the Senate. Pachter has also reached out to Feeding America and members of the Long Island congressional delegation for their support.
Unlike the first presidential commission, which focused on world hunger, the proposed one would target domestic hunger, a persistent problem that has been greatly exacerbated by the pandemic, affecting an estimated 54 million people. On Long Island, about 50,000 people were food insecure in 1980, compared to 480,000 currently, according to Pachter. “It doesn’t have to be that way,” he said.
The last commission resulted in the publication of a large report whose recommendations were never acted upon, as the Carter administration ceded to the Reagan and Bush administrations. Pachter expects a new commission could review the full range of existing programs and develop recommendations for significantly improving food security. “Where does the country need to put money so we can move out of the cycle of poverty?” he said.
Long Island Cares needed to do some online sleuthing to figure out where to send its proposal letter. With President-Elect Biden not yet in office, there was no contact information for the new administration to be found. Google searches eventually unearthed an article that mentioned The Queen Theater in Wilmington as the place where cabinet interviews were being conducted. “So that’s where we forwarded the letter,” Pachter said.
Pachter is hopeful that the proposal will receive a positive reception. “Because of Covid, food insecurity has never received this much attention,” he noted.
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