IMPROVING NEW MARKET TAX CREDIT ACCESSIBILITY TO ADDRESS FOOD VULNERABILITY.

As middle to upper-class Americans panicked over the national shortage of toilet paper, for a moment they came close to understanding what it was like to be poor in the United States. In April 2020, we united as a nation as canned foods, flour, sugar, and cleaning supplies flew from grocery store shelves with no certainty of the quick restock to which many of us are accustomed. For the first time, many of us could no longer spontaneously stop by the grocery store to pick up an ingredient for the recipe we bookmarked over the weekend. Due to COVID-19 stay-at-home orders and fear of catching a deadly virus, we reevaluated what was truly necessary and limited purchase of fresh produce to opt for nonperishables that we could stock up on for the month. Although much of the past year has been unprecedented, the limited access to groceries and food items is not. A glaring 23.5 million people in the United States regularly do not have access to affordable, healthy food options because there is no nearby grocery store.1 Liquidity constraints also diminish lowincome people's reserves of what many agree to be basic necessities. Even when readily available, low-income households pay 5.5% more per roll of toilet paper than they would if they purchased in bulk and on sale like higher-income households.2 Poverty is expensive, and the COVID-19 pandemic forced indigent communities to incur a higher-than-usual food insecurity cost. The relied-upon resources that kept many people fed such as local food banks, pantries, and schools were either struggling to meet heightened demand or shut down.3 For many, public transportation is the only affordable means of getting to a grocery store. The enclosed, crowded space is inapposite to any Center for Disease Control (CDC) guideline issued regarding the pandemic, putting low-income individuals at higher risk of contracting the virus. Indigent communities are risking their lives for a basic necessity: food. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]