Relates to reporting on food security trends

Showing the cosponsors who are on Agora, A to Z. The official record may list more.

• Democratic13
• Republican2

This bill has cosponsors from more than one party.

Shown in neutral colors by design; Agora is non-partisan.

◆ The sponsor's argument

Why Michelle Hinchey says this is needed

Ever since the passage of the National Nutrition Monitoring and Related Research Act of 1990, the Economic Research Service (ERS) of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) has produced an annual report on national and state-level household food insecurity. That reporting has now stopped. After 35 years, the USDA unexpectedly announced in Septem- ber that it will no longer produce the report, leaving policymakers in New York and elsewhere to "fly blind." The USDA's report measured the extent and severity of household food insecurity,. provided data on household food expenditures, tracked the use of various food and nutrition assistance programs (including the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also known as "SNAP" or "food stamps"), and identified the food security status of households, chil- dren, and adults across the country and in New York. New York's policy- makers cannot effectively and efficiently track hunger trends or make informed decisions for investing taxpayer dollars without such report- ing. This bill directs the Department of Health (DOH) to begin producing comparable annual reporting as part of its participation in the Behav- ioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS). DOH can produce such reporting by opting to include the United States Household Food Security Survey Module, known as the "Six-Item Short Form Economic Research Service," in its annual survey process. Enhanced BRFSS reporting will be particularly important in the upcoming years, as the latest federal budget bill, H.R.1, made deep cuts to SNAP. Under the new federal law, the number of New Yorkers who remain eligible for SNAP is expected to decrease significantly, and as a result, to notably increase the number of New Yorkers who experience food insecurity.

This is the sponsor's own case for the bill, quoted from their memorandum. It is not Agora's description of what the bill does.