food not bombs, under legal fire

The charity organization food not bombs has been at odds with local law enforcement and the New Mexico Environment Department because they refuse to stop serving free food without a food license. The group has been issued several warnings to stop serving food without a license in front of the UNM bookstore. This week food not bombs was informed by the New Mexico Environment Department that they would be liable for a $3000 fine and forceful removal by APD if they did not comply with their request to stop serving food. This seems like action to take towards a charity group that is only trying to help spread a message of sharing and good will.

So is the New Mexico Environment department justified in taking legal action against food not bombs? I would say that from a legal standpoint they do have enough cause to threaten food not bombs with legal retribution (after all, every food vendor is required to have a license to serve food) However perhaps the NMED should take a look at food not bombs background and use their good judgment to determine whether or not their food could pose a significant health threat. On the group’s blog, they state that they have been serving healthy vegetarian food to the public since 2005 and have never encountered any incidents of people becoming sick from their food. From my perspective this shows that the group is obviously responsible about serving food to the public. From this perspective, I don’t understand why the NMED would choose to legally threaten this responsible charity that has no record of food-related health problems, instead of monitoring restaurants that have been red flagged several times for sanitary issues. I also feel that these actions are rather tasteless, as state organization should make an effort to help charities instead of haggling them with legal procedures. (Unless of course, someone has been affected negatively by the charity.) In short, I feel that food not bombs is a responsible charity that is merely trying to spread the message of helping others in need, and local government should promote the persistence of these charitable groups, instead of treating them as a nuisance.