Testimony Presented before the Progressive Congressional Caucus

Katherine Engles, President of the Kensington Welfare Rights Union

For the "Economic Human Rights: The Time Has Come" event, sponsored by the Institute for Food and Development Policy, Food First, the Institute for Policy Studies, and the Progressive Challenge

Wednesday, September 23, 1998

I was raised by an aunt and uncle. My uncle worked and I never knew what it was like to be hungry at those times. My uncle was a good man, but as good as he was to me it wasn't the same as having a mother, my real mother.

I didn't understand why she didn't take care of me. I used to think I wasn't good enough or that I was too ugly for her. There were so many hang ups that I grew up with. When my mother got older, I was able to take care of her. For the first time in my life, I had a chance to spend time with her, and find out why she didn't take care of me. And when I found out, she said to me, "I loved you. I always did. I still do." She said, "I knew that I didn't want to see you starve. I couldn't feed you, and I knew my brother could." That took a lot of the pain away, but after such a long time.

As an adult, there were times when we had nothing to eat. It isn't that I never worked! I worked since I was 14 years old. The jobs that are out there -- you're not making enough in order to live. Mothers go hungry at night so their children can eat. I had once written a poem where I had to invite the mayor to a formal dinner behind Burger King or McDonald's -- a trash can and to make sure not to be late or they take the trash away.

Today, I'm a grandmother. My daughter told me that she had cancer of the cervix. First thing on our minds is that she's taken off public assistance and she has to go to work. We didn't know what we were going to do. My health is not good and with my daughter having cancer, its scary. We talked to the kids and told them we may end up on the street again. You don't know what you're going to do. You freak out, you cry a lot. Eating behind Burger King is the real deal. You have to find a way to feed your kids no matter what it takes. And if its going into people's trash cans, hey, I have no pride when it comes to my kids.

When you're hungry, its really hard. Sometimes I would psyche myself up to a cup of tea and try to make myself feel as though I just ate a full course meal even though I didn't. Sometimes I would roll bread up into little dough balls to try to fill myself up. It gets to the point where you kind of get used to it. Till today I can't eat more than one meal a day. Its what I'm used to and even today its about all we can afford anyway.

You go to places like Baltimore, to Arkansas, or some of the places the Freedom Bus went to. Deserted places, no more businesses. It tells you something. There are no more jobs. Its like a ghost town. Makes you wonder what they have planned for us. I keep looking at the bigger issue. What's ahead for our children, our grandchildren! What is ahead for them?