Bread for the City

We had an honor of a visit today: U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack came to Bread for the City.

“It’s amazing what’s being done here,” Secretary Vilsack told us. “You are doing phenomenal work, making a difference in the lives of people every day.”

The Secretary was here to announce important new federal anti-hunger initiatives. More than 50 million Americans are “food insecure” (in other words, they struggle daily to acquire nutritionally adequate food). Here in DC, one in eight people are food insecure, including two out of every five children.

“These are friends and neighbors, folks we know,” said Secretary Vilsack. 

It’s an outrage. And it’s a complex problem with no easy solutions. However, Secretary Vilsack and I both agree: the solutions are there. It’s just up to us to make them work.

So let’s get started. Will you stand with us?

Today, Secretary Vilsack unveiled new USDA resources like an anti-hunger tool kit for community leaders like us, and an online commitment drive for pledges of anti-hunger action. “It’s necessary for the community to get engaged to ensure that these youngsters are not left alone,” said the Secretary.

See more about these USDA initiatives at their new website: Endhunger.USDA.gov 

We’ve been working long and hard to end hunger. Bread for the City now offers food assistance to more than 23,000 people in a year, making us the largest food pantry in DC. With the hard work of Americorps members and volunteers like you, we’ve launched initiatives like Glean for the City to great success, reaping tens of thousands of pounds of surplus produce that now goes to the tables of the hungry instead of to waste.

But providing food to the hungry is just the start.

In recent years, we’ve helped to successfully lobby the District government to expand eligibility for food stamps in our city. Through cooking classes, we are actively promoting change at home. And our rooftop garden project is creating a vision of a healthy, green community right above us.

We know we can’t do it alone. It’s up to all of us. As Secretary Vilsack said today, “It’s not just the responsibility of the volunteers of the country, or the non-profits of the country, or the Department of Agriculture. It’s our individual responsibility to be engaged.” That’s why our clients and staff have joined 35 organizations, coalitions, and passionate individuals around the city to call for the creation of a formal food systems network in DC.

And there are so many ways we can push for a hunger-free community — and they all start with you. So will you answer Secretary Vilsack’s call? Stand with the USDA, Americorps, Bread for the City and your fellow neighbors as we work together to eliminate hunger from our cities.

Make a donation today, as we champion the effort for a hunger-free community.

Stay tuned for more reports from today’s exciting event. Meanwhile, join the DC Food For All google group if you’d like to learn about how to work for food justice right here in the District today.

This post is the first by Donna Hendricks, a Rep Payee client who we’ve raved about before. She is passionate about the issues of affordable housing and mental health, because funding for those programs impacts her personally, so she’s been a regular participant in the budget discussions each Friday from 11:30 – 1:00 at our Northwest Center. Last week she sat down to share her opinion on the DC budget cuts.

What happened to the homeless? What happened to low- and middle-income people? They got lost in a crowd. What happens to us, the money we need to live, to eat, just to survive, and depend on?

I’m a 61 year old woman who has been homeless and now has a roof over my head. But with the budget cuts, I live in fear of my rent being cut, fear of being back on the streets. Not only do I have mental health issues, I have physical health issues too. I have no use of my knees any more, and other problems. I’m scared of what would happen if I became homeless again.

I don’t need the pressure. We don’t need the pressure.

We have an overpopulation of the homeless already, so what’s going to happen when they close all the shelters for singles, when they end programs like IDA (Interim Disability Assistance) and stop building affordable housing?

If these cuts happen, more people will be homeless, which will drive them to mental illness, drinking, drugs, and other things they’ll do to survive and belong. When you’re homeless, it can feel like nobody cares. It’s lonely. You have no place to take a bath, no roof over your head, no necessities. It’s a hopeless situation.

Our Councilmembers need to hear from people who’ve experienced these things. It’s very important to voice our opinions. Otherwise they won’t know what it’s like. And if they don’t know what’s going on, what can they do about it? They’ll ignore the situation. They’ll keep their priorities in the wrong place. Streetcars and convention centers instead of homeless shelters and affordable housing. They think so much of the well-to-do that the low- and middle-income get forgotten. People who are really wealthy should pay their fair share, which isn’t happening right now.

So please, do all that you can to not make me homeless again.

Editor’s Note: You can join Donna and other clients and staff at 6:00 pm on Tuesday, May 3rd at the John A. Wilson Building, as we rally together with the Continuum of Housing Campaign at CNHED and Latino Economic Development Corporation. Help us tell the City Council that we need funding for the housing to keep our neighborhoods healthy and whole.

April is Language Access Month, which marks the 7th anniversary since the passing of the DC Language Access Act, which provides meaningful access to DC government services for limited and non-English proficient individuals through oral interpretation and translation of vital government documents. In celebration of Language Access Month, we invite you to join Bread for the City, Many Languages One Voice, and the DC Language Access Coalition on April 27 at 6:30 PM at the All Souls Church, 2835 16th Street NW. An excerpt of the film “Communities in Translation” will be shown for the first time in public. For more details and to RSVP, please contact info@dclanguageaccess.org.

There’s certainly lots to celebrate during Language Access Month – both the landmark act itself and the recent success of a Language Access Act complaint against the DC Department of Human Services filed by my Bread for the City colleague Stacy Braverman. (See her compelling report on the case in this recent blog post.)

However, we also recognize that there are larger systemic problems with the legislation and its oversight. Currently, the only way to enforce the Act is to file a complaint through the Office of Human Rights (OHR). At OHR’s recent performance oversight hearing, I gave testimony that called for amending the Act to allow individuals to sue agencies in a DC court and provide a right to appeal an OHR decision.

As my testimony below lays out, in recent decisions regarding oral interpretation, OHR is not effectively fulfilling its role to oversee and ensure compliance with the Language Access Act. If it is not enforceable, the DC Language Access Act is just a law on the books, with no teeth. In order to ensure that the Act is enforced, individuals must have a private right of action to sue agencies in court. In addition, if individuals choose to file complaints through OHR, there must be a way to challenge unfavorable OHR decisions. Though we received a successful OHR decision recently, other complainants have not. As I outlined in my testimony, even though we believe OHR has misapplied the law in some cases, there is no mechanism to appeal a decision by OHR.

Under DC law, people who have suffered other types of discrimination have several options to enforce their rights. If a DC agency treats me unfairly because of my race, for instance, I can choose to file a complaint with the Office of Human Rights or I can sue the agency directly. If I choose to file a complaint with OHR and I disagree with its decision, I have a right to appeal that decision.

To bring the process in line with what governs OHR discrimination complaints, Bread for the City is working with our fellow members of the DC Language Access Coalition to propose an amendment to the DC Language Access Act. Our proposed amendment would give teeth to the Act, by ensuring that language discrimination is treated the same way as other forms of discrimination.

For more information, check out my testimony:

Testimony of Allison Miles-Lee
Staff Attorney, Bread for the City
D.C. Council Committee on Aging and Community Affairs
Public Performance Oversight Hearing on the Office of Human Rights
March 3, 2011

Good morning. My name is Allison Miles-Lee. I am a staff attorney at Bread for the City, which is a non-profit organization in D.C. and a member of the D.C. Language Access Coalition. I’d like to share some concerns we have about the Office of Human Rights’ (OHR) oversight and enforcement of the Language Access Act (“Act”) through its complaint process.

Under the Act, the OHR complaint process is the only way to hold agencies accountable for violations of the Act. Specifically, the Language Access Director of OHR is required to “track, monitor, and investigate public complaints regarding language access violations at covered entities, and where necessary, issue written findings of noncompliance to the covered entities regarding failures to provide language access.” D.C. Code § 2-1935(b)(2) (2011). Currently, the Language Access Act does not provide a private right of action that would give individuals an alternative to filing a complaint with OHR, nor does the Act provide an explicit right to appeal an unfavorable OHR decision.

In recent OHR determinations regarding oral interpretation, OHR is essentially rewriting the Act by its misapplication of the Act. In passing the Language Access Act, the Council clearly mandated that agencies provide oral interpretation in all languages needed by their customers. In contrast, the Act does not require agencies to provide written translation in all languages. The Act provides a framework for each agency to determine the languages for which it is required to provide written translation. Again, with respect to oral interpretation, it does not matter whether the individual speaks Spanish or Swahili, everyone must receive oral interpretation. There are no exceptions.

In coming to its determinations, however, OHR appears to apply other standards not provided for in the Language Access Act, such as the agency’s reasonableness and provision of partial services. As a result, OHR is finding that agencies are in compliance when we believe they have actually violated the law. Complainants then have no other recourse to challenge the agency or encourage it to come into compliance.

While the Language Access Act makes it clear that oral interpretation must be provided in all languages, it does not specify which type of oral interpretation service is required. For instance, agencies could rely on bilingual employees, paid live interpreters, or a telephone interpretation line. On an annual basis, agencies are required to make a determination of the type of oral language services they will provide, based on a four-factor analysis. This analysis includes: 1) The number or proportion of limited or no-English proficient (LEP/NEP) persons of the population served or encountered, or likely to be served or encountered, by the agency (agencies should already be doing this analysis to determine which languages require written translation); 2) The frequency with which LEP/NEP individuals come into contact with the agency; 3) The importance of the service provided by the agency; and 4) the resources available to the agency. The Act offers further guidance for factor 1, offering suggestions of data sources that agencies can consult in making their determinations.

The four-factor analysis is a requirement imposed on agencies as they decide the types of oral interpretation they will provide. For example, the Department of Human Services (DHS) might determine that it has a large population of Spanish speakers already frequently accessing its important services and that it is able to hire Spanish-speaking staff without d
ifficulty. Accordingly, for Spanish oral interpretation, DHS may decide to staff all its service centers with bilingual staff who can provide Spanish oral interpretation to customers. For a language like Swahili, however, DHS may determine that it does not have a large number of people currently accessing services at the agency and does not anticipate having a large number in the future, after consulting data sources. So, for Swahili, DHS may decide that, at least for now, oral interpretation will be provided by a telephone interpretation line.

In several recent determinations, OHR appeared to mistakenly apply the four-factor analysis described above to determine whether an agency was required to provide any oral interpretation for a certain language or not, when this analysis should only be used when agencies determine the type of oral interpretation to provide.

In addition to mistakenly applying the four-factor analysis to determine whether agencies are, at the outset, required to provide oral interpretation in a certain language or not, OHR has applied standards not outlined in the Act, including a reasonableness standard and a capacity standard. In another case, OHR considered the fact that at least some people were given oral interpretation, though not all. With regard to oral interpretation, none of these lines of inquiry is relevant under the Act to determine if the agency is in compliance with the Act.

In two recent determinations, OHR acknowledged that the agency did not provide needed oral interpretation to the complainants. However in both cases, OHR went on to apply an additional reasonableness standard that is not outlined in the Act. Since OHR determined that the agency acted “reasonably,” it found that it did not violate the Act.

In another written determination, OHR did an analysis of whether an agency had the capacity to provide oral interpretation services before it determined whether the agency complied with the Act. Again, this standard is not outlined in the Act.

Finally, OHR found that another agency did not provide adequate oral interpretation. In fact, the agency itself admitted that it had used bad interpreters and a number of Mandarin-speaking individuals were denied access to the agency’s services as a result. Nonetheless, OHR found no violation since the agency showed that it made an effort to get better interpreters at subsequent events, and eventually “some of the participants were able to have meaningful participation in the process,” though not all.

As these recent examples show, OHR is not effectively fulfilling its role to oversee and ensure compliance with the Language Access Act through its written determinations. Based on how OHR is coming to its determinations, it is clear that OHR is applying standards that do not exist in the Act. The standards that OHR applies are changing the requirements of the Act, and there is currently no mechanism for review of OHR determinations under the Act. We urge the Council to amend the Act to provide a private right of action and right to appeal an unfavorable OHR determination.

The Language Access Act is an important piece of legislation that brings D.C. to the national forefront of language access. If it is not enforced, though, it is meaningless. Thank you.

We’ve got two positions opening up in Bread for the City’s Northwest Medical Clinic. Spread the word!

SEEKING: Medical Clinic Enrollment Coordinator

The Medical Enrollment Coordinator’s primary responsibility is the screening and assessment of all medical patients for healthcare program eligibility.

Reports to: Enrollment Supervisor

Responsibilities:

• Screen all medical patients for healthcare program eligibility
• Perform general intake for patients
• Complete and follow up on applications for healthcare programs
• Work with the enrollment supervisor and medical clinic director in problem solving and planning for the future
• Assist with other administrative medical tasks as assigned

Requirements:

• Exemplary interpersonal skills
• Ability to work with a wide variety of people including patients suffering from a variety of physical and/or mental illnesses and volunteer doctors, nurses and other health care professionals
• Strong organizational and computer skills
• Ability to manage multiple projects and responsibilities simultaneously
• Good listening skills, patience, perseverance, flexibility and a commitment to working for and with low income people
• Spanish fluency.
• Sense of humor, flexibility, optimism, and a cooperative spirit in a fast-paced and familial environment

Bread for the City is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, pregnancy, national origin, ancestry, age, marital status, sexual orientation, family responsibility, physical or mental disability, medical condition, status as a veteran, or any other category protected by applicable federal, state, or local law, except where a bona fide occupational qualification applies. Please send résumé to Dr. Randi Abramson via e-mail to medicalclinic[AT]breadforthecity[DOT]org.

SEEKING: Medical Assistant

Responsibilities:

• Work in lab as phlebotomist
• Order supplies for lab, exam room, medications, patient assistant medications
• Keep exam rooms and supply room stocked and organized
• Maintain the quality control logs in the lab to comply with OSHA standards and overseen by the medical director
• Maintain medical equipment through annual check and as needed for broken equipment
• Copy medical records to be sent to outside sources
• Maintain immunization inventory
• Perform needle exchange and track data

Requirements:

• Commitment to working with low-income residents of DC
• Completion of a training program for medical assistants or equivalent experience
• Strong interpersonal skills, and an ability to work well with a wide variety of people
• Strong organizational skills and attention to detailFlexibility, optimism, and a cooperative spirit in a fast-paced and familial environment
• Efficient, hard working, and punctual

Reports to: Medical Director

Bread for the City is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, pregnancy, national origin, ancestry, age, marital status, sexual orientation, family responsibility, physical or mental disability, medical condition, status as a veteran, or any other category protected by applicable federal, state, or local law, except where a bona fide occupational qualification applies. Please send résumé to Dr. Randi Abramson via e-mail to Medicalclinic[AT]breadforthecity[DOT]org.

The needle exchange rider seems to have since been pulled off the table. (Though Congress did pass a rider prohibiting the use of federal funding for abortions.)

The episode has left us thinking back to the 90’s, when

a Congressional ban on federal funding for needle exchange actually did prevent these programs from spreading through the District. For many years, Bread for the City’s medical clinic was pretty much the only source of free, clean needles aside from the mobile distribution operation PreventionWorks!, which just recently closed.

In a quote that we’ve cited before and almost surely will again, our deputy director Jeannine Sanford is more blunt: “We did it because we don’t just stick our heads in the sand. Bread for the City does what’s going to save lives. We do what works.”

To get a sense of what this program looks like and why it’s important, consider our story about Lisa. Lisa has suffered from various ailments — including abscess in her stomach and Hepatitis C — that are attributable to her drug abuse. The Hepatitis C, she believes, was received from a dirty needle.

But Lisa can’t get clean needles at a pharmacy, because you needs to have a prescription or some other demonstrated proof of need. Without health insurance, this isn’t a viable option for Lisa one way or another. And she is justifiably wary about being reported to the police.

Lisa used to rely on the PreventionWorks mobile needle exchange program — and since receiving free, clean needles, she’s remained infection-free. Now that PreventionWorks! has closed, however, Lisa would have few options for a reliable and regular supply of clean needles.

But Lisa can turn to Bread for the City. And she trusts us. We’ve been doing this for more than a decade, and she knows from word of mouth on the street that our services are safe, reliable, and respectful. She’s developed a relationship with our lab technician, Kayleigh. And through that relationship, she became a primary patient at our medical clinic. Since then, her health has improved even more.

Our medical clinic director Dr. Randi explains: “When Bread for the City describes itself as a medical home, we imagine a place for all members of the community to have access to resources to keep themselves healthier and safer. Just as medical care is offered in conjunction with food and legal assistance and so on, it makes sense to offer needle exchange as part of the continuum of screening, diagnosing, education, and treatment that we provide with each visit.”

Indeed, though the longtime federal obstruction of needle exchange in the District is far from the only reason our HIV/AIDS rate is the worst in the United States, it’s certainly a factor. One in five cases of HIV/AIDS infection occurs as a result of intravenous drug use. Research indicates that cities with needle exchange programs have seen an 11% decrease in infections-by-syringe when compared to cities without such programs.

After some tentative progress forward, DC is currently falling backwards on this front. Bread for the City is now one of the District’s only three providers of needle exchange services, along with Helping Individual Prostitutes Survive (or HIPS) and Family and Medical Counseling Services. And in the time since PreventionWorks closed at the end of February, our monthly amount of exchanged needles has more than doubled.

Though this matter may be “last week’s news” as far as the media is concerned, the need is not going to go away. So even if needle exchange is off the table in this round of congressional budget debate, we believe it’s important to continue to convey the value of this preventive program to the health of our city.

In the meantime, if you’d like to support our needle exchange program in this time of need, please make a donation to the program at this page.

Bread for the City’s needle exchange program is funded in part by the DC Government’s Department of Health (HIV/AIDS, Hepatitis, STD, and TB Administration – or HAHSTA).

—George Jones, Executive Director

It’s springtime, and we’re gardening — on our roof. You may find that announcement to be strange, even surprising; but it’s true. And I think it’s awesome.

Will you help us build these gardens? We’re looking for volunteers to get to work, and donors to make it all possible. The garden installation will take about 200 hours of volunteer labor, and cost $50,000. Help us make this vision a reality. 

Become a member of our Community Supported Agriculture project!

We’re pleased to introduce Malton Edwards IV, Bread for the City’s first Job Developer! Malton comes to us from Hartford, Connecticut, and has a masters in public administration, with a minor in economic development and urban planning. That makes him a perfect fit for us!

As an undergrad at Howard Universtiy in 2005, I first came to Bread for the City to volunteer in the food pantry — and the organization impressed me right away. From then on, when I thought of service in DC, I immediately thought of Bread for the City. It’s very comprehensive. In some communities it’s hard enough to find medical and legal services, let alone food — and for them to be all encompassed in one space, it’s just really exceptional.

I was actually coming back to volunteer on the day that I saw the job opportunity and applied.

Now I’m working here as as their first job developer in their Pre-Employment Program; also knows as PEP. PEP helps clients build job readiness skills, self confidence and self esteem. We look at the whole person and identify their needs. From what I can see, being a professional job developer is about three things: Development, Research, Advocacy.

By developing a person – getting them ready, building their portfolio, and bringing them through a personal metamorphosis – we’re able to prepare them for the job that they desire (not just the one that we can fit them into).

By engaging in research, we can see what’s out there. Using the web and our networking skills and even just a cold telephone call — that’s what helps us find the opportunities for our clients.

Then, advocacy. That part is actually going out to the employers and advocating for the clients and our program itself. We talk to employers about our clients, and we talk to them about our services and our program, so that they know and trust us. Even if they don’t hire a particular applicant whose resume they have in hand, they know about us in the future.

I’m finding that this job is tons of trial and error. Throw out stuff and see what works. But that’s something I like to do. I’m dressed in a tucked shirt and tie four days out of five. And you really don’t have to do that at Bread for the City. But I’m making sure to demonstrate to the clients that this is what it means to be employable, to be professional.

And it’s starting to work. The classes in our Pre-Employment Program are still small — just 8 people. But we’ve already had 5 successful job placements so far.

One person had a criminal record in his background, which would normally prevent him from getting a job. As an additional challenge, he Originally he was averse to things like dressing up. He wanted to be a chef, so from his perspective, wearing a tie wasn’t necessary. We had to explain that in a job interview, you’re marketing yourself — and not just one specific skill, but yourself as a whole person. We worked with him to revamp his resume and cover letter and groom him for the workplace. When he came back to us and told us his story of meeting with the employer, he said the employer loved his resume and loved his deportment. And now he has a job as a cook. He’s on his way.

Another client doesn’t have a high school education, and she didn’t have high confidence or interpersonal skills. But she’s been dedicated in coming to class, revamping her resume and cover letter. The other week she went out and applied to 14 jobs. That’s just not something she’d done before. And she got two interviews this week. She said it’s all been a liberating experience for her – not just the work on getting the jobs, but the whole process of personal evolution. Now she comes to PEP classes in business attire. You have to dress yourself mentally before you can go out and do these things, and that’s what we help with here.

One of my great inspirations is Newark’s mayor, Cory Booker. He says ‘you’ll never have a great Newark without a great educational system.’ And you can see that here in DC, especially east of the river. The educational system is broken, which leaves people without hope. If people are better educated and better trained, things will start to turn around.

Though Bread for the City’s services haven’t included education per se, we do consider ourselves a center for personal development — and so a curriculum of things like job readiness fits right into our model and worldview (alongside classes like cooking and computer literacy). In this, like everything, we take a holistic approach: it’s not just trying to help you to find a job, but about helping you become a whole person.