STATEMENT: Share Our Strength’s Lisa Davis on the Senate Passage of H.R. 6201 “Families First Coronavirus Response Act”

Contact: Meredith Jorss, mjorss@strength.org

WASHINGTON, DC - Today the U.S. Senate passed the Families First Coronavirus Response Act (H.R. 6201), a package of policies that will help communities respond to the coronavirus pandemic, including funding for emergency provisions that provide food aid for low-income families. The following is a statement from Share Our Strength’s Senior Vice President Lisa Davis:

"We commend the Senate for taking bipartisan action to pass H.R. 6201, the Families First Coronavirus Response Act, a critical step toward ensuring communities have the resources and flexibility they need to respond to the needs of families and children during this pandemic.

For families across the nation, this is a global pandemic that impacts local living rooms. Schools have been closed or scheduled to close in every state and as many employers reduce hours or lay-off workers, millions of families are facing tough trade-offs between food, housing and other basic needs. Passing this relief bill will help ensure kids who rely on meals at school are still getting the nutrition they need when school is closed.

We are pleased that this legislation empowers states, communities and schools with essential tools and resources to help meet this growing need. Provisions include:

• $500 million for The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC)
• $400 million to fund food for distribution through food banks
• Providing families whose children receive free or reduced-price meals with funding equal to the value of those meals on an EBT card when schools are closed for at least 5 days
• Important flexibilities within school meals, SNAP and WIC to reduce red tape and make it easier for states and communities to feed impacted families and children

This support is greatly needed. We estimate kids in need will miss more than 101 million meals this week alone.

As this crisis unfolds, No Kid Hungry is committed to supporting community efforts to feed the children who are missing those critical school meals. Part of this effort includes making local emergency grants available to ensure kids across the country have access to free meals during this uncertain time.”