Urge Congress to Restore Funding to WIC

Too many new parents across the country have to ask themselves a very painful question. “Do we have enough money to ensure our new baby will be able to eat nutritious food?” I can’t imagine what it must be like for parents, who are so excited and hopeful for their child’s future, yet worried every day that they will be unable to feed their child well and set them on a path toward success later in life.

The Jewish tradition teaches, “by the breath of children God sustains the world (Talmud Bavli, Shabbat 119b).” All of our promises of a more just country, a cleaner environment and a more peaceful world, will be worked on by the next generation, and generations after that. Today, we have an obligation to provide the resources this young generation will need to be the people who will continue in these efforts.  And, if nothing else, a newborn infant should not be so deeply affected by the income inequality in our country. Every child, regardless of where they live, or how much money their parents make, deserves adequate nutrition.

Congress is currently in the final stages of negotiating a budget for the next year. Thanks to the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015, many of the harsh spending cuts that were made in past years have been eased. This means that money is available to fund essential human needs programs that have been cut. Congress must act to restore the more than $600 million of funding that has been cut from the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, also known as the WIC program. WIC is an important part of ensuring young children are set on the path to success later in life.

The WIC program provides a modest benefit, about $60 in food vouchers, to over 8 million women with infants and children under five years of age. These vouchers are used to purchase infant formula, milk, cereal, bread and other food items that ensure young children receive adequate nutrition at the very first stages of life. Children whose mother participated in WIC scored better on a mental development assessment at age two, compared to children of low income families that did not receive WIC. And, the benefits of WIC persist throughout a person’s entire life. Infants who are fed based on federal infant feeding guidelines were more likely to achieve higher education and higher incomes when these infants grow up.

The WIC program provides a number of unexpected benefits as well. Many WIC providers have the ability to recommend vaccination services to new parents to ensure their children get the recommended vaccines. Further, since WIC produces demand for certain healthy foods in low-income communities, WIC has helped bring fruits, vegetables and other healthy foods into countless places where they could not be found before. As states have been forced to stretch their shrinking WIC budgets further and further, the quality of the program has been declining, reducing the impact of these important benefits.

Urge your members of Congress to protect this core program in the budget. We are also asking Congress to restore funding to housing choice voucher program which helps low income family, many of whom have children, find affordable housing.  We pass our tradition and our values l’dor v’dor, from generation to generation. Let’s provide for our next generation and in turn sustain the world.