To a staggering rate of deadly shootings.
Top priority is to take on Louisville's
violent crimes after the shooting that
happened last night as business was
the scene of a shooting yesterday.
Homicide numbers trend higher
than this point last year and
young people remain involved.
In your mind. In your experience,
is there a link between food and
security and violent crime? Absolutely.
Vincent James is the president and CEO
of Dare to Care Food Bank in Louisville,
and he's flagging food insecurity as
an issue at the core of the city's
rising rates of violent crime.
Now, one of the things we know from research,
we know and in terms of really just
being in the field and actually seeing
if I were to take a heat map and
place all of the violent crimes in
our city and cross overlay that with
all the areas of food insecurity.
It would be the same.
The correlation of food insecurity
and violent crime is widely researched
nationally and around the world.
Some reports show for every
1% rise in food insecurity,
violent crime rates increased 12%.
Geographically speaking,
if you look at a map of East level,
you'll notice several major grocery
stores offering foods that are
widely considered to be staples
of healthy and proper nutrition.
Conversely, a look at West level.
Shows 2.
That's two grocery stores for a
population of more than 60,000 people,
and where the median income is
$22,000 a year and where access to
transportation is often limited.
When is the last time you've been hungry
and couldn't eat or couldn't buy food?
Or you were hungry and you couldn't get
anywhere because you don't have a car.
Taylor Ryan is the founder and
executive director of the nonprofit
Change Today, Change Tomorrow,
Fighting for food justice and
public health in West Louisville.
It is atrocious. It is disgusting.
Like, to me, it's a it's a slap
in the face to know that, like,
there's constantly grocery stores popping
up in the East End and to see, like,
I live three blocks away from the office.
If I go to Kroger on 28th and Broadway
or there's a safe a lot up the street,
like that's my only option.
I have more General Dollar General
stores and dollar stores in the
neighborhood and like mom and pop
hot food areas with hot chips,
then I do actual fresh food options.
In his first budget as mayor,
Craig Greenberg has suggested a
$6,000,000 subsidy fund for grocery
stores in downtown and other parts of
the city that lack access to them.
But. Ryan and James both
agree more needs to be done.
I don't see people that don't look
like me talking about in leading
efforts to try to change this outside
of some national organizations.
But when I think about this
locally, I don't see it.
Taylor's organization receives
surplus food from Trader Joe's,
a total of about $400,000 worth
per year, and reroutes it to
those who are food insecure,
She says that's something other
big stores could. And should do.
What you can do right now if
you are the manager at Kroger
is call your local food justice
organization and rewrite your surplus.
There are many solutions.
I'm not like the end all be all here,
but I think eliminating our
food waste is a very good start.
In the past year There to Care
has helped provide more than 21
million meals to those in need.
Still, James is quick to point out it's
not enough to meet the growing needs.
And in terms of the relationship between
food insecurity and violent crime,
he says providing is prevention.
There has to be a point in time when
the world says, our community says
our country says enough is enough,
you know that that we can no longer
continue to repeat these cycles
that we're continuing to see.