Farmers' markets are great places to buy healthy fresh fruits and vegetables. But many folks who receive food assistance benefits (Latinos make up 41% of WIC participants and 15% of SNAP participants) can't use those benefits at the market. Farmers' markets across the country are trying to change this, equipping their markets with machines that can turn the food assistance benefits into currency farmers can accept in exchange for fresh food. In Alaska, a handful of markets in the state introduced debit card readers, a small change put in place to give Alaskans who use Quest cards, the delivery system for SNAP funds, the ability to purchase fruits, vegetables and even plant starters. When the first two machines were installed in 2011, revenue for the two pilot ...
How can YOU... ...make "active play" essential? (Page 1) ...start a community garden? (Page 3) ...make your county healthier? (Page 5) ...teach kids to eat better? (Page 6) Find out in the latest Salud America! E-newsletter. Salud America! The RWJF Research Network to Prevent Obesity Among Latino Children is a national program of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The program aims to unite and increase the number of Latino stakeholders engaged in community change and research on environmental and policy solutions to the epidemic. The network is directed by the Institute for Health Promotion Research at The UT Health Science Center at San Antonio. Don’t forget to share your stories at our new Salud America! Growing Healthy Change website. We can help you get a ...
Many groups across the country work to tackle the rising childhood obesity issue and one way they accomplish this is by teaching kids where real food comes from and how to grow it. Project GROWS's goal is to lower obesity rates among children and youth in Staunton, Waynesboro, and Augusta County through connecting children and youth to the food they eat. A community farm where kids learn about healthy living, Project GROWS is all about teaching through hands-on experiences, like getting dirty on the farm and selling produce.
Recently, Project GROWS has been incorporating local farmers' markets more into their work, noting that farmers' markets are a great place to introduce folks to new fruits and veggies and creative ways to prepare them. They now manage the North ...
Parks, plazas, and bike racks are all a part of the City of Los Angeles' new People St initiative---a program created to get the community's input on affordable ways to improve the built environment. Launched earlier this year as a way to involve the community in designing healthy public spaces, People St allows residents to submit proposals for three project types: Parklets;
Bike Corrals; and
Plazas. In a statement on the People St webpage, Mayor Garcetti said: "Fundamental to People St is its bottom-up, community-based approach." Community groups like neighborhood associations and business districts are eligible to submit their proposals to LA DOT after getting support for a project. However, the projects must be located in areas with high pedestrian traffic to be ...
Efforts to increase consumption of fruits and vegetables among women and young children receiving food assistance are paying off, according to a study by the Yale Rudd Center for Food Policy & Obesity. The study is published in Public Health Nutrition. Revisions to the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) were implemented in 2009 to offer foods that better reflect dietary recommendations for Americans. Latinos comprise 41 percent of WIC recipients. Rudd Center researchers examined fruit and vegetable purchases made at a New England supermarket chain by households participating in WIC over a two-year period. Fruit and vegetable spending and volume purchased by these households were compared before and after the WIC ...
CA4Health works in rural and small California counties to reduce chronic disease and illness by helping bring about changes in the community that make it easier for people to make healthier choices in their daily lives. Many of these communities have a high Latino population. In Humboldt County, the local health department partnered with students and staff at Eureka High School to implement Hydration Nation, an effort that increased the access and appeal of fresh drinking water as a healthy alternative to the sugary beverages that are helping fuel the nation’s obesity epidemic. At Eureka High School, there were 11 older-style water fountains available to the 1,200 students and 80 staff members, none of which allowed easy filling of the reusable water bottles which were gaining ...
Equipping farmers' markets to accept Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits is one way to encourage low-income families to purchase more healthy fruits and vegetables. In Nashville, TN in late April 2014, The Tennessee Department of Human Services, the Tennessee Department of Agriculture and the USDA’s Food and Nutrition Service hosted the Farmers’ Market On-Site Application and Approval Event for markets interested in receiving free wireless point-of-sale (POS) devices equipped to accept SNAP benefits. Through this event, eligible participants were also able to receive approval to process SNAP transactions within the day, versus the normal processing time-frame. Last year, SNAP recipients spent an average of $175 million in benefits per month. ...
Jeff Anderson, a parent at Wolftrap Elementary School in Fairfax, Va., wanted his daughter to bike to school. Unfortunately, the school had no bike racks. He went to the principal and the school installed bike racks. Anderson then joined other parents, school officials, and community partners to improve one of the school district’s transportation policies. Now parents from all over the community, including those with large Latino populations, have created safe routes for kids to walk and bike to district schools.
EMERGENCE
Awareness: In Spring 2008, Jeff Anderson noticed that there were no bike racks at Wolftrap Elementary School in Vienna, Va., a city with a 12% Latino population. An avid bicyclist, Anderson wanted his then-first-grade daughter to learn biking’s sense of ...
As part of a community effort to combat obesity, in May 2014 the Leesburg Farmers Market in Leesburg, Virginia began accepting Supplemental Nutritious Assistance Program (SNAP), dollars for purchases of fresh produce. It's the first farmers' market in the county to accept SNAP benefits. Customers using SNAP at the market also will receive Double Dollars, meaning for every $10 spent at the market, they will get an additional $10 toward their purchase. The Northern Virginia chapter of healthy food resource Buy Fresh Buy Local, sponsored by Inova Health Systems, is contributing $1,500 for that effort and fundraising efforts are ongoing to help sustain the matching program. To get the community to the market, county health officials are arranging transportation to the farmers' ...
