PHILADELPHIA
According to Project H.O.M.E Philadelphia needs 60-90,000 affordable housing units to meet the current demand in Philadelphia.
For shelters, it costs the city $30 per day, per person. A family of three averages a stay of 95 in a shelter. The money spent to shelter a family could assist and subsidize housing for a 2 bedroom home.
More than 440,000 Philly residents receive SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program). Still more than 150,000 Philly residents qualify but do not participate in SNAP.
Hunger can look like obesity: families stretch dollars by buying food with little nutritional value; mothers often cut back on their own measl to support their children.
Hungry people are 30% more likely to be hospitalized, twice as likely to need mental health services, are 50% more likely to repeat a grade and two times as likely to require special education.
In PA alone, the state pays $3.25 billion to fight hunger. ($2.4 billion for medical and mental health care, $330 million in lost educations achievements and worker productivity, $517 million in costs for charities that work to relieve hunger.)
HADDINGTON, WEST PHILADELPHIA
Haddington, located between 52nd and 63rd street, bounded by Chestnut to Girard, is just one of the many underserved neighborhoods in Philadelphia.
Re-certified in 2006 as a blighted neighborhood by the Philadelphia City Planning Commission, Haddington is home to over 1,700 building code violations and over 180 vacant lots or homes.
Reported on 89% of submitted tax returns, the average salary in $22,880.
27.3% of families, 31.5% of individuals, and 35% of single mother families are living below the poverty level.
14.4% of people have public assistance income.
The current “fair market rent” based on Housing Urban Development is set at a price that the people of Haddington are unable to meet. They are unable to relocate to other sections of Philadelphia, pay too much for rent and are forced to ration other necessities.
Often families are forced to sacrifice expensive nutritional meals for food that contains little nutrition. There is a severe inaccessibility to affordable fruits and vegetables because of the lack of super markets in this neighborhood.