Think people in poverty are scamming the system? Think again!

Who's really scamming the system?

Each summer we operate a summer program called Urban Experience. The program is designed to educate people outside of the inner cities about issues that impact our friends and neighbors in the inner city.

This year we are working with the USDA to provide a session called Buck and a Half lunch, the amount per person, per meal that families receive through food stamps. The USDA's goal is to teach people how to make healthy meals with only $1.50 per person.

Our goal at the Urban Experience is to educate people on the time, effort, and obstacles associated with attempting to provide that healthy, buck and a half lunch.

Although I am very aware of the research and commentary that talks about the injustices and inequities in the inner city, it always strikes me harder when I actually see it laid out on paper. I had asked two of the people helping with the Urban Experience to price the menu ingredients at the local Walmart and the community corner store. Despite my awareness, I was still shocked by what I saw.

Before I show you the numbers, keep in mind that...

1. The prices only compare foods that are similar in brand; we did not try to make this look worse than it is by comparing name brand to off-brand.
2. The community corner stores lack the majority of foods needed in order to create this healthy lunch; therefore, without adequate transportation, these healthy meals would not even be an option.
3. The community corner stores offer primarily chips, soda, and snack foods. These high in sugar and fat foods offer the ability for a filling food, though not healthy.
4. When comparing prices, corner stores often offered small sizes (like 8 oz) while grocery stores offered larger sizes (like 16 oz). When comparing prices, we had to purchase two 8 oz sizes in order to equal the 16 oz we needed for the recipe.
5. The corner stores did not offer a cheaper, store brand. All items were name brand.

In the price list below, the first price is Walmart, the second is the community corner store, and the third number is the difference between the two.

Chili powder $3.18 $2.36 +.82

Flour tortillas $1.50 $1.79 +.29

Black pepper $2.50 $1.99 +.50

Green beans $.50 $1.19 +.69

Vegetable oil $3.88 $3.99 +.11

Vinegar $.62 $.99 +.37

Pineapple $1.12 $1.69 +.57

Ramen noodles $.14 $.50 +.36

Salsa $2.50 $2.99 +.49

Miracle Whip $2.12 $2.99 +.87

Paper plates $1.28 $1.59 +.31

napkins $1.64 $1.39 +$1.14

The total amount spent for one meal at the corner store versus the grocery store is $5.93 more. Of course, most of these are condiments and sides. Most corner stores don't stock up on healthy foods for neighbors to purchase.

When you take into account that if someone has no transportation or bus fare and would need to purchase their items from the corner store, $5-$6 extra per day to make a meal ends up being about $150-$180 per month.

Is it really the poor who are taking advantage of the system??

From little things, big things grow

From Little Things Big Things Grow

A Song By Paul Kelly and Kev Carmody ©1992



This song talks about an 8-year strike by the indiginous people of Australia beginning in the 60s. Though it took eight years, the Australian government finally acknowledge the people and returned their land to them. Just this year, the government apologized.

The message is powerful and has much application to us in the United States today.

• "Now you failed to imagine what if it happened to you" ...What if we decided as a country to imagine others' situations as our own? What if we thought about things from other people's perspectives? Would we change bus routes? Would we beef up police presence? Would we improve the schools?


• "We must all play our part" ...Change can't come from just one side. Otherwise, it gets defeated by those who push harder and want more for themselves. We have to be in this together...rich and poor, black and white, neighborhood to neighborhood.


• "It seems to me that if we can imagine the injustice we can imagine the opposite and we can have justice" ...If we truly looked at what was injust in communities across our cities and our nation, we would be able to understand how to create justice. But when we stay focused on ourselves, we miss out on the injustices others face.

We are all very much alike and have similar desires, hopes, and dreams...if only we can look past the barriers that separate us.

In Turner Courts, we are doing little things. In urban communities across America, people are doing little things. But "from little things, big things grow." I look forward to that day.

Wharfies on May Day march, Sydney 1965

As Prime Minister of Australia, I am sorry.
On behalf of the Government of Australia, I am sorry.
On behalf of the Parliament of Australia, I am sorry.
And I offer you this apology without qualification.

To say sorry means to give respect
It’s long overdue
Now you failed to imagine
What if it happened to you

Now they’re not only words now it’s not just a symbol
Accepting the past, well it’s not always simple
When thinking of yesterday
We live for tomorrow
We can’t face the future now
Till we face the sorrow

Now under the colours, yeah
Of red, yellow, black
We say “Never again”
We say “No turning back”

From little things, big things grow
From little things, big things grow
From little things, big things grow
From little things, big things grow

Lighting up the path
With good in our heart
See the more that you look
The better for all
So he sang as he walked
And together we stand
For we’re sure to stand tall
We must all play our part
[Rudd: “indigenous and non indigenous”]
Tears within our brow
Yes forward we struggle and all we’ve achieved
Will be nothing if greed was the only motivation of man
So we can love one another, and with respect for each other
Then we move forward [”reconciled”] together

From little things, big things grow
From little things, big things grow
From little things, big things grow
From little things, big things grow

There are moments in the lives of nations
Where hope and history rhyme
And now’s one of those times
Let’s close the gap and if we truly mean it
we can stare down our future and find
we can see through those eyes
And let us not stand with those who deny

It seems to me that if we can imagine the injustice
We can imagine the opposite
And we can have justice

From little things, big things grow
From little things, big things grow
From little things, big things grow
From little things, big things grow

[rpt]

All of us are one, because we are human
And if I cut you, you cut me, what comes out?
red blood, not different colour blood, only red blood. Yes.

Building walls internally and externally

"You have got to be kidding me!" was my first thought as I read the title of the New York Times article: U.S. Erects Baghdad Wall to Keep Sects Apart.

Is that our new solution to everything?? If we can't get along or if we don't want to deal with them, build a wall. Talking to and listening to people is too difficult, I suppose. It takes too much time, effort, understanding, and (God forbid!) possibly some compromise about what we have always thought is the "right" way to do things!!

Walls allow us to block people from our view...We don't have to see them. We don't have to deal with them.

Do walls work??

Creating walls and distance seems, to me, to have started in the 60s. People moved out of the city fleeing people who looked different than them without any desire to even try to get to know the people they were running from. People moved out and built large houses with alley garages and privacy fences. But the walls, gates, and backdoor entrances did not keep them from having problems...drugs, domestic violence, and homocide still exists in their homes, too.

Despite the failure of creating barriers from our fears, we still continue to create walls...only now they are bigger, more obvious, and very deliberate...We can't figure out how to deal with immigration, so we create a wall....We don't know how to handle the Shiite and Sunnis, so we create a wall. The way we're going, I wouldn't doubt if the next wall built separates inner city communities from suburbia. (I'm only being slightly sarcastic here. The rate we're going, it honestly wouldn't surprise me. It scares me to think we would do that, but wouldn't surprise me.)

What's worse than a physical wall, however, is that those physical walls help create and allow us to justify our emotional walls. We have created these walls in our own country, and now we are projecting our fears and our unwillingness to listen and compromise onto the global society. We avoid people we don't know and/or don't understand. We say that "they won't listen to reason," but the reality is we haven't taken the time to listen to them. We say that "they're taking over our country," but we haven't sat down with them to listen to their delimmas and asked them to help us create a solution. We say that "our inner cities are violent and uneducated," yet we want to be selfish and keep all of the resources for our own children and our own communities.

We ignore and refuse to believe the intelligence and capacity of people who are different than us.

Walls ostracize people. They create barriers between people. They create anger and resentment because people do not know each other.

For those of us who recognize this, we have to actively work against this...in our own hearts, in our communication with our politicians, by our actions, and by our choices. Walls do not eliminate our problems; they exacerbate them.

Putting up fences

I was listening to a radio report on NPR this morning. The commentator was expressing his belief that we shouldn't erect a physical barrier between us and Mexico. He believes a physical barrier presents a negative symbolism to both countries.

I have to agree.

It made me think back to my first couple of years at Central Dallas. I was originally hired to run our food pantry. The food pantry consisted of an "interview room" (a large waiting room with little side rooms for interviewing) with a "front desk" area and a food "warehouse" in the back. What struck me early on was the black wrought-iron fence that separated the [White] people interviewing from the [Black and Hispanic] people being interviewed. The symbolism in that drove me absolutely crazy until I couldn't take it any more and literally (with the help of a friend) ripped it out of the wall. The fence...the barrier...seemed to provide a strange sense of "comfort" and "safety" to the suburban volunteers. It had to go.

Tearing down the barrier between us was also a symbolic move. More and more people from the community (people coming in for food) began to be a part of our operation...interviewing, distributing food, helping make decisions for the future of the pantry, etc. until now the food pantry is comprised of 90-95% community volunteers. (Sadly and unfortunately, many of the surburban volunteers slowly stopped coming after that). It was amazing to me what was accomplished when we invited everyone to the table. Before tearing the fence down, we struggled to have enough volunteers. However, once we became serious about inviting the community in and working together, we were pretty fully staffed most days.

It's the same with Mexico. We can continue to erect barriers and provide the symbolism that "We don't want you," and "Fix your own problems...don't come to us to provide the means to fix them for you." Or, we could tear down the barriers (literally and figuratively) and work toward figuring out a way to work with our southern neighbor to make life better for all of us. The second option sounds like a much better deal to me.