This story was reported and written by Radio IQ.
Virginia’s Commission to End Hunger was started this year with the hope of addressing food insecurity. And ahead of the 2025 legislative session the commission recommended a number of efforts they hope elected officials will consider.
Delegate Rae Cousins submitted a bill during the 2024 session to address hunger on college campuses, and now she’s a member of Virginia’s Commission to End Hunger
“There are a lot of college students going under the radar, who are food insecure, can’t access food and are probably embarrassed to say so,” Cousins told Radio IQ.
The 2024 effort was turned into a survey whose results are expected any day, but the commission still voted to recommend a similar effort, informed by that survey, in the 2025 session.
But the vote wasn’t unanimous, Delegate David Owen was among no votes:
“I believe our public institutions have plenty of funding already to deal with this publicly, but we’re excluding the private colleges that don’t have the same resources,” Owen told the committee after the vote.
Cousins said she’d keep that in mind when drafting the bill, especially considering Virginia’s private historically Black colleges and universities.
But the commission meeting still felt a storm approaching. With President-elect Donald Trump threatening to take a wrecking ball to many federal programs, co-chair delegate Cia Price said the commission’s work may become more important than ever.
“I’m not quite as hopeful about what could be happening at the federal level," Price told Radio IQ. "But I think that makes us have to do our job even more on the state level.”
Two other efforts, one study and one workgroup and both designed to address Virginia’s hungry, were also recommended
