Question 1 on Oʻahu’s ballot this year will ask voters if they’re for or against establishing a new Special Fund that would dedicate 0.5% of real property tax revenue to a Food Security Fund.
This would not be a new tax, rather it would join the five existing special funds under the Honolulu Charter, including the Clean Water and Natural Lands Fund, the Affordable Housing Fund, the Climate Resiliency Fund, the Honolulu Zoo Fund and the Grants in Aid Fund.
What the fund would do
In a report from last year, the Hawaiʻi Foodbank found that nearly 1 in 3 households across the state experience food insecurity.
“Here on Oʻahu, almost a quarter million people are food insecure, meaning they don’t have regular access, consistent access to safe and healthy food,” Amy Miller, the Hawaiʻi Foodbank’s president and CEO, told HPR. “Many of those folks are extremely food insecure, going without eating for whole days on a regular basis because there just isn’t enough money for food.”…