At Thanksgiving, the poor pay for dumb regulation.
Just another example of excessive government and lack of common sense on the part of public officials.
By WILLIAM MCGURN
This Thursday, in a parish hall not far from the New Jersey town green where George Washington once made his winter headquarters, as many as 300 people will gather for their Thanksgiving meal. Some will be homeless, some will be mentally ill, some will be old, and some will be folks and families who have just hit a hard patch. For all of them, Morristown's Community Soup Kitchen and Outreach Center is one of the few blessings they can count on.
In many ways, this soup kitchen illustrates Tocqueville's point about the American genius for voluntary association. Having started out in a local Episcopal church, it has grown into a network that links restaurants, corporate sponsors and community groups with volunteers from nearly three dozen church congregations, including this reporter's. The result is a hot meal to anyone who comes to the door each noon, no questions asked.
This the men and women of the Community Soup Kitchen have provided for 26 years, not once missing a day. Now comes a challenge greater than any snowstorm or power outage. Earlier this year, the Morristown Division of Health ruled that henceforth the soup kitchen would be considered a "retail" food establishment under New Jersey law.
From that single word far-reaching consequences have flowed. In a column for a local blog, Ray Friant, a volunteer from the Morristown United Methodist Church, called the rule "crazy." Over Sunday breakfast at a local diner, Mr. Friant, his wife, Emmy Lu, and another church couple who also volunteer at the kitchen, Barbara and Jim Morris, spell out what they mean by crazy.
Most obvious is the higher cost: at least $150,000 more a year. To meet this increase, the kitchen is asking each participating church to up its own contribution. Some congregations don't have the money. For those that do, it will mean less for some other need.
Much of this cost results from a new prohibition on people donating food they've prepared at home. For those on the giving end, often this was the only way they could participate, so eliminating their contributions means eliminating volunteers. For those on the receiving end, it means no more homemade meat loaf, lasagna, cakes and so forth.
All, of course, in the name of food safety. Still, one suspects that when a co-worker brings a tin of Christmas cookies to a friend inside Morristown's Division of Health, those cookies are not forbidden because they do not come wrapped from a supermarket or approved restaurant. Yet this is precisely the restriction these officials have imposed on men, women and children whose only hope for a home-baked cookie might be at the soup kitchen.
Finally, there's the utter soullessness of the thing. For example, many of the women would bring their own aprons from home. No more. Now it's all latex gloves, throw-away aprons, and a ban on food servers even entering the kitchen. In short, more institutional cafeteria than Grandma's house.
Teresa Connolly, the soup kitchen's director, did not return phone calls. No doubt her top priority is keeping the kitchen going, and many appear to have concluded that the best option is getting along with the government. The senior pastor of the Friants' church, Neill Tolboom, notes that the soup kitchen appreciates that the town continues to let it do its work right near the main square, and he says his hope is that by adapting to the new government rules the result will be healthier meals for those whom the kitchen feeds.
Mr. Friant and his fellow volunteers say no one opposes reasonable measures to improve cleanliness. The question is whether this is a solution in search of a problem. In the 26 years this kitchen has been open, there seems to be no case of food poisoning. Maybe Morristown officials would do better to seek out those who actually eat there, and put to them this question: Do you feel safer and better off now that we've protected you from home-baked apple pie?
So what's the solution? It may be as simple as getting the Division of Health to reconsider. Unfortunately, Darlene O'Connell, the town's health officer, refused to comment, directing a reporter to her superior, Thomas Alexander, who did not return several calls. If, on the other hand, it turns out the push is from the state, surely Gov. Chris Christie and state lawmakers would be happy to work out a resolution that advances health while preserving the more personal elements that make this kitchen such a gift to those in need.
On a 1995 trip to New Delhi, Hillary Clinton visited an orphanage run by Mother Teresa's nuns. She came away impressed by the great love and care she found there. With no small irony, she noted it was a place that "would not have passed inspection in the U.S."
At least not in Morristown.
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Published in Wall Street Journal 11-22-2011
