{"id":503645,"date":"2026-10-22T02:28:16","date_gmt":"2026-10-22T02:28:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/503645\/"},"modified":"2026-10-22T02:28:16","modified_gmt":"2026-10-22T02:28:16","slug":"state-lawmakers-get-briefed-on-food-insecurity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/503645\/","title":{"rendered":"State lawmakers get briefed on food insecurity"},"content":{"rendered":"

There are a lot of people in San Diego County who aren\u2019t sure where their next meal is coming from. Feeding San Diego said 13%, or about 430,000 people, are food insecure. That includes 123,000 children.<\/p>\n

Food insecurity was the subject of a state senate hearing in Kearny Mesa Wednesday. \u201cAddressing inequality means listening to our community,\u201d Sen. Dr. Akilah Weber-Pierson<\/a>, D-39, said as the hearing got underway.<\/p>\n

Weber-Pierson was joined by her colleague, State Sen. Steve Padilla<\/a>, D-18. For about two hours, the senators listened to experts in food insecurity and healthcare.<\/p>\n

\"State<\/p>\n

State Senator Dr. Akilah Weber-Pierson is shown talking to hearing participants at the County Operations Center on Oct. 21, 2026.<\/p>\n

\"State<\/p>\n

State Senator Steve Padilla talks to participants in a hearing on food insecurity at the County Operations Center on Oct. 21, 2026.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn California in 2025, 24% of all adults in California experienced food insecurity,\u201d said Jared Call, the Director of Public Policy and Advocacy at the California Association of Food Banks<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Call said for 16 million Californians, the cost of basic needs in their community exceed their income. “The basic needs we use to calculate this measure include housing, healthcare, transportation, childcare and food,\u201d Call said.<\/p>\n

Another witness told the senators that not having enough to eat can often lead to poor health.<\/p>\n

\"Cardiothoracic<\/p>\n

Cardiothoracic surgeon Dr. Alexandra Kharazi is shown at the hearing on food insecurity at the County Operations Center on Oct. 21, 2026.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs a surgeon, this has very real implications on not only pre-op care and post-op care,\u201d said Dr. Alexandra Kharazi<\/a>, a cardiothoracic surgeon who advocates for cardiovascular health. She sees the cumulative effects of decades of food insecurity and poor nutrition in many of her patients.<\/p>\n

\u201cParticularly in the South Bay, where I do a lot of my work, people oftentimes, there\u2019s more of a disparity with the food people are able to have access to,\u201d Kharazi said.<\/p>\n

Healthy food for children pays off<\/p>\n

Representatives of the San Diego Unified School District and California Department of Education said state support for getting good, healthy food to children is paying off. They credit a program called California Universal Meals that the state launched five years ago.<\/p>\n

\"Kim<\/p>\n

Kim Frinzell, the director of Nutrition Services at the California Department of Education is shown (on the right) at the hearing on food insecurity at the County Operations Center on Oct. 21, 2026. Alicia Pitrone Hauser, the executive director of Food & Nutrition Services at the San Diego Unified School District is shown beside Frinzell.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just kind of a no-brainer, it\u2019s just common sense and the research confirms that when they\u2019re well-nourished, there\u2019s improved concentration and cognitive function,\u201d said Kim Frinzell, with the California Department of Education Nutrition Services<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Both Weber-Pierson and Padilla sit on committees that deal with the health of Californians. They said they\u2019ll take what they learned back to Sacramento, and work on crafting policies that will improve people\u2019s lives. That will include where they money will come from to support those policies.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There are a lot of people in San Diego County who aren\u2019t sure where their next meal is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":503646,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[74,76,75],"class_list":["post-503645","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-diego","tag-san-diego","tag-san-diego-headlines","tag-san-diego-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503645","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=503645"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503645\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/503646"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=503645"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=503645"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=503645"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}