Continued delay in the Farm Bill results in contraction of program participants.

From LA Regional Foodbank http://www.lafightshunger.org/images/CSFP050208.pdf

The effects of increased commodity prices and tight federal funding are having a significant impact on seniors and families throughout Los Angeles County. Funding and food volume trends for two key United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) commodity programs, the Commodity Supplemental Food Program and the Emergency Food Assistance Program, are resulting in local needy seniors and families receiving less food or being turned away from service.

The Commodity Supplemental Food Program (CSFP) is a federally funded program which works to improve the health of elderly people at least 60 years of age, low-income pregnant and breastfeeding women, other new mothers up to one year postpartum, infants, and children up to age six by supplementing their diets with nutritious USDA commodity foods. The Foodbank has been allocated by the State of California to serve up to 10,000 households (primarily seniors) on a monthly basis in recent years, but the Foodbank's current allocated "caseload" is 7,232 monthly clients. The Foodbank served 8,200 households in March and April and, due to complex federal administrative rules, is required to cut 1,500 households (primarily seniors) from the program starting in May. In all, 12 distribution sites will be closed, and the remaining distribution sites will not be allowed to add more clients to the program.

Sites target for closure are: Center for Healthy Living in Van Nuys, Telacu Pointe in Los Angeles, Golden Age Apartments in Monterey Park, Hawthorne Housing in Hawthorne, Gardena Apartments in Gardena, Telacu Vistas in Los Angeles, Kingsley Adult Daycare Health Center in Los Angeles, Glenoaks Adult Daycare Health Center in Burbank, Grandview Apartments Culver City, Arcadia Adult Daycare Health Center in Hollywood , Telacu Del Rio in Pico Rivera and Telacu Villahermosa in Whittier.

"The Nutrition Title of the Farm Bill has received significant bipartisan support, and we urge Congress to quickly pass the final version and the President to sign the bill into law," said Michael Flood, President and CEO of the Los Angeles Regional Foodbank. "If the Farm Bill had been passed and signed into law in 2007 as scheduled, we are certain that we would not be cutting seniors from the CSFP program today and more families would be accessing USDA commodities through the Emergency Food Assistance Program," Flood added. "Given the current economic climate in Los Angeles County and increased food and fuel prices, many families and individuals are experiencing hunger and need assistance today."

A report released by the L.A. County Department of Public Health in September 2007 noted that 471,000 households (more than 1 million people) in the county experience "low food security" and are unable to meet basic food needs. This report was published before the recent slowing economy and the increase in food, fuel and other expenses. This represents a 17% increase in the number of food insecure households since their last published study in 2005.

The Los Angeles Regional Foodbank is a non-profit, charitable organization established in 1973 and is one of the largest food banks in the United States. Through a network of nearly 900 charitable agency sites, the Foodbank supplies enough food for over 500,000 meals each week in Los Angeles County. The Foodbank is affiliated with America's Second Harvest, the Nation's Food Bank Network. For more information, visit www.lafoodbank.org.

It’s a beautiful sunny afternoon on the Westside and Amalia Kessler stands at the broken sidewalk of her white picket fenced Santa Monica home watching movers round up the final pieces of her antique furniture into a Beverly Hills moving truck. Wearing a straw hat, a beige coat and holding a small briefcase in her hand, a neighbor consoles Kessler on her shocking and sudden eviction. At 85 years old, it dawns on Kessler that the items she holds in her hands are the only belongings she has left from her former life.

“They took everything I owned," Kessler says in an interview with RTLA. “My furniture, my clothing, my photographs, every shoe and every scarf, everything that I owned except for the clothing on my back and a few personal items. They took my life.”

Back in June of 2007, a Massachusetts court order informed Kessler of the expulsion of her life estate, which included her little Santa Monica home. Kessler was legally granted the property in 1990 under the will of her friend and neighbor, Gita Caplan. Caplan, a former ballet dancer who owned a dance studio in Santa Monica in the 70s, promised the life estate to Kessler, who had been her caretaker until her death. Caplan’s will, drafted by her attorney, named Amalia Kessler the life estate holder and Tatyana Berman of North Andover, Massachusetts, and distant third cousin of Caplan, the remainder holder. Under this arrangement, Kessler would hold full rights to the granted property until her death, at which the life estate would pass over to Berman.

Yet in 2001, Kessler’s life estate was slowly being revoked under what seems to be an odd and illegitimate premise. According to Sam Heissel, Kessler’s friend and domestic partner who has done substantial research on the case, Kessler is an innocent victim of fraudulent bankruptcy. After being forced to leave their home, Heissel discovered that Berman declared bankruptcy after suffering a costly divorce. In addition to collecting assets from Berman, the Massachusetts bankruptcy court insisted that the property of Amalia Kessler was now property of the court, despite the fact that the life estate stated that the property could not be transferred until the death of the holder. In 2004, years after Berman’s divorce, her lawyer sent an appraiser to assess the value of Kessler’s property. Finding her small Santa Monica abode worth $1.8 million, Kessler’s home and her personal belongings were collected - and she was left homeless.

“I lost everything to the Germans in Austria. I never though this would happen to me again. I never thought this could happen in America. This is my American holocaust,” she says.

Kessler fled Austria through the cold winter Alps and arrived in Switzerland to escape the Nazi regime. She eventually came to the United States during the 1950s, settling in Los Angeles where she began working as a teacher. During the time she was living in Hollywood, she met Gita Caplan who, after becoming good friends, asked Amalia to take care of her when she became ill. Honoring the allegiance of a friend, Kessler quit her teaching job and became Kaplan’s fulltime caretaker.

In exchange for a fulltime salary, Caplan allowed Kessler to stay in her home rent free. When Caplan died in 1990, Kessler was granted a life estate worth $200,000. The official life estate in Caplan’s own words: “Amalia is allowed to remain living in the said residence for as long as she decides rent free.”

“They are evicting an 85-year-old woman who worked in this country for many years and maintained the property,” Heissel says. “She paid property taxes, received full legal rights to [it] and lived in Los Angeles for 17 years. She has legitimate rights, but still this person can be thrown in the street?”

Heissel, a car mechanic who's conducted extensive research on the case without any legal assistance, insists that Kessler's case is part of a larger scam exploiting elderly women. “Tatyana sold the property for $1.3 million,” he claims. “The woman knew Amalia had a life estate and took advantage of an elderly woman.”

“Where was this person when I was wiping Gita’s soiled diapers?” Kessler says.
After the eviction, Kessler spent the little money she had on motels and hostels, but eventually ended up in a city shelter. The instability and emotional distress she has suffered, including living in her car for months, caused Kessler to develop pneumonia and she was hospitalized at UCLA. She was then placed in a convalescent home until she could no longer afford it. Today, she’s settled into a small apartment in Culver City and is barely surviving on her social security check, which she says is quickly diminishing. Heissel recently reported that Kessler broke her hip.

Heissel and Kessler have been solicited by several legal experts who deal with cases of elder abuse, but the couple are reluctant to meet with anyone since they can barely make ends meet, let alone hire a lawyer. All Kessler has is hope that someone will be able to provide the couple with legal justice in order to gather the pieces they still have left of life.