COMBATTING MALNUTRITION IN THE UNITED STATES

WHEREAS, the Senate Subcommittee on Employment, Manpower and Poverty has observed, firsthand, conditions in Mississippi that it can only describe as shocking, and which it believes constitute an emergency; and

WHEREAS, this Subcommittee has been informed by three federal agencies that similar conditions exist in other states:

RESOLVED, that this Convention ask the President of the United States to take the following steps wherever similar conditions of widespread malnutrition exist:

• Make food stamps available under the federal Food Stamp Act to people without cash income;

• Lower the food stamp cash purchase requirements for families with low cash income;

• Investigate and correct reported incidents where food stamp recipients have been required to pay more for food stamps than required by law;

• Distribute free, federally-owned foods through local private and public agencies;

• Direct the Office of Economic Opportunity to provide emergency family loans to subsidize food purchases;

• Direct the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare to provide supplementary welfare payments;

• Give consideration to invoking such other emergency authority as may be vested by law in the Executive Branch.