Thousands of children will either be eliminated from or refused enrollment in the Women, Infants and Children nutritional program unless officials come up with more funding.
It's the first salvo in what looks to be a volley of cutbacks in social service programs. The Department of Human Services expects to have a list within the next 30 days of programs it will scale back or eliminate.During a meeting last week, department Director Norman G. Angus said - not for the first time - the resources within the department are stretched so thin that "we are trying to do too much and consequently not doing anything very well."
We don't yet know where cuts will occur, but indications are they will be across the spectrum of social services. Possibilities that have been mentioned include no longer handling truancy referrals and cases of educational neglect of children, as well as not conducting supervised, court-ordered visitations.
Whole programs not required by the federal government may also be eliminated or scaled back.
While the WIC program is not handled through the Department of Human Services (the Health Department takes care of it), it is very much a human needs program and the problem it faces is not unlike those faced in other programs.
WIC provides vouchers to eligible pregnant women, infants and children who are at nutritional risk. The vouchers entitle the program participant to purchase a certain amount of milk, baby formula, juice, eggs and other commodities each month. They can also buy peanut butter and dried beans or peas on alternate months.
Grocery stores accepting the vouchers are reimbursed by the program.
The cutbacks result from a combination of two major factors: the rising costs of the commodities (particularly the milk and baby formula) and an increase in the number of people who qualify for and need the program. An estimated 43,000-45,000 women, infants and children receive nutritional help that way.
And an official in the program for the state said that WIC in Utah only serves about half the people who are eligible for it.
Allowing the cutbacks seems to be contrary to everything Americans - both private citizens and officials - seem to believe in. If you ask someone whether he would help provide nutrition to a child, he would undoubtedly say yes.
But the reality is, the program's in trouble and no one has stepped forward to provide that nutritional assistance. It's estimated that $1.5 million would allow the program to continue to function at its former level.
The effects will be seen in a lot of ways. Our elected leaders talk about how important it is for children to go to school ready to learn, but a hungry, unhealthy child is fighting tough odds.
The cost will also show up a little down the road in public-funded health care costs - and possibly in our criminal justice system, even further down the road.
The impact will most likely first be seen in area food pantries. But those pantries will not provide the milk and dairy products so desperately needed by nutritionally deficient low-income children. Pantries traditionally don't have dairy products on hand. There isn't any available, and most couldn't store it if they had it.
So the pantries will probably see more people looking for other staples, as they begin to use very limited resources to pay for needed dairy products.
I fear a lot of the children will simply do without these nutritional foods.
I was criticized recently by a man who said that, given the chance, I would be "awfully free with his money" in support of social programs.
In a way, he's right. Although I'd love to pay low taxes, I'd also like to see people given a hand to become self-sufficient. I believe that most of us live awfully close to the streets and a crisis could put us there.
I don't apologize to anyone for my belief that helping people out a little (particularly with things like providing nutrition to poor children) is as important as giving tax breaks to such things as the ski industry or improving lakes.
I also don't begrudge the money I personally put into the school system, though I have no children. I think that the education of today's youngsters is important to everyone's future, including mine.
I think that future is tied into a lot of things - and for our children to have a future, they must survive a lot of things, including hunger, poverty and abuse.
It's not a matter of bringing more money into the system. It's a matter or really looking at our priorities. If people aren't important, I don't know what is.