In case you missed it, here’s our Executive Director’s June 22, 2012 Letter to the Editor in The Oregonian, in response to David Sarasohn’s recent column on the 2nd Annual Multnomah Food Summit:
When I read David Sarasohn’s recent column (“Local food summit’s missing ingredient: Congress,” June 16), I had two thoughts. 1) I’m grateful to live in a community where residents take action to promote food justice and where elected leaders say things like Multnomah County Commission Chairman Jeff Cogen did: “Food justice is at the heart of the values of Multnomah County.” 2) Though I agree that the federal farm bill is a key — and frustratingly distant — ingredient in real food justice across Oregon, local and state governments around the country (such as San Francisco, Seattle and Connecticut) are embracing a different — and hearteningly closer — form of food justice. How? By enabling restaurant workers to earn paid sick time while they work so they can afford to recover from illness where they should — at home. Right now, more than 87 percent don’t, with obvious economic and health consequences.
Now that’s a type of food justice we can accomplish right here at home. No Congress required.
Andrea Paluso
Northeast Portland
Paluso is executive director of Family Forward Oregon.