How can LI say no to the hungry?

The Rev. Thomas W. Goodhue is executive director of the Long Island Council of Churches.

One in 10 of our neighbors on Long Island is at risk of going hungry. Who is going to feed them?

More than 30 years ago, Nassau County asked the Long Island Council of Churches to establish a five-day-a-week food pantry. It promised to cover the operating costs if we found food for those the county referred to us, knowing it can take months for people who qualify for food stamps or other assistance to receive them.

But now, Nassau County is telling not-for-profit organizations that we'll be paid less money this year to do work on behalf of the government -- but we'll be expected to do as much work or more. Late last month, the Department of Social Services informed the council that it is cutting this year's contract to provide emergency food by 21 percent.

This year, we will be reimbursed $100,000 to feed more than 1,200 people each month -- hopefully giving them enough to eat for two or three days. In Suffolk, where the council started in 1920, the situation is far worse. There, the county pays $5,000 per year for the 700 or more people we help each month.

The original arrangement with Nassau County -- we found the food, the county paid operating expenses -- worked when the Department of Social Services referred 200 people to us a month. But the county has sent us a steadily growing number of people to feed without increasing its reimbursement in 30 years -- even though the costs of salaries, insurance and such keep rising. Last year, Nassau covered less than 40 percent of the pantry's operating costs, and it now demands we absorb an even larger loss or abandon the poor.

We are not the only nonprofit organization that the counties are cutting, of course. Nassau blames current cuts on the Nassau Interim Finance Authority, but the squeeze began before the county faced any crisis. I'm not pleading for the state to subsidize the church. It is the other way around: Congregations are subsidizing work on behalf of government.

We are struggling to find new donors, but we don't see a way to further reduce expenses. We can't find space elsewhere for an emergency food pantry for less than the $810 a month that the county charges us to run the program. Yes -- the county charges us rent to provide services on its behalf. We receive food through Long Island Cares, Island Harvest and food drives conducted by churches, synagogues, libraries and scout troops across the Island. We are already paying pathetic wages to the three part-time employees at our Freeport pantry and using volunteers everywhere possible.

Certainly both Nassau and Suffolk counties face fiscal challenges. But this all raises a troubling question: Which people should we turn away? This isn't hypothetical. The shelves were nearly bare in Riverhead only last week, and we had to tell guests to come back another day.

Should we send back to social services the unemployed young mother who walked to Freeport from Hempstead with a 7-month-old recently for baby formula because she had none and couldn't afford bus fare?

Should we send to the legislatures those who have been unable to find work, despite their best efforts?

Should we refer to the county executives senior citizens who can no longer work and can't make ends meet on Social Security?

Cain may have been trying to dodge a murder rap when he asked, "Am I my brother's keeper?" but this is a fair question. Perhaps congregations and charities should take care of the hungry without government assistance. Some people believe government has no responsibility to care for the vulnerable. It's a valid political philosophy -- but what if there are more hungry people than charities can feed? Am I my brother's keeper only if I feel like it? Should a child go hungry if volunteer efforts are insufficient?

Nearly every faith teaches compassion for the poor, and Jesus taught that nations will be judged on the basis of whether they help the hungry, the sick, the poor, the imprisoned and others he called "the least of these my brothers and sisters."

If government isn't going to see that these brothers and sisters are fed, who will?