McDonald's is expanding it's offerings for kids by adding Go-Gurt, a flavored yogurt usually eaten by children, to it's Happy Meals. The Chicago Tribune reports that beginnig July 4th, a low-fat strawberry yogurt will be availalbe as a side in Happy Meals and Mighty Kids Meals as an alternative to french fries or apple slices, which were added in March 2012. McDonald's appears to be doing this in response to many parents pleas to offer more healthy options with kid's meals. The new Go-Gurt option will have 50 calories and 6 grams of sugar in it's 2.25 oz serving. The fast food chain has been under criticism for many years because of it's possible contribution to the childhood obesity epidemic in America. Appearing along side the yogurt option is a new animated character ...
By 2005, increased rates in childhood obesity and a lack of green space were becoming a concern for the residents of Baldwin Park (80% Latino). The city seemed to lack parks and places of recreation, so the community came together to develop a Parks and Recreation Master Plan. One strategy mentioned in the plan was the shared use of land between schools and the city, as a cost effective method to increase active spaces. When Parks and Rec. officials learned of a community development grant which could provide funding for shared use projects, they entered discussions with Baldwin Park Unified School District (BUSD), to see about developing a shared use agreement, to keep school property open during after-school hours. Plans for the 2010 shared use agreement were approved by the ...
Most kids look forward to summer; school is out and there is more time to play. But many kids who rely on free or reduced lunch at school are left hungry in the summer months. The USDA's Summer Food Service Program (SFSP) is one way to ensure that kids continue to get the nutrition they need even after the last bell rings. However, some states struggle to find sites for the lunches and often have a hard time signing up eligible kids. Tennessee has the third fastest-growing Latino population in the country, many of which are immigrants in need of services like SFSP. The Tennessee Department of Human Services (DHS) is partnering with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and local agencies across the state to kick off their 2014 Summer Food Service Program. To celebrate ...
The Berkeley City Council agreed to put a sugary drink tax on a community poll assessing possible ballot measures for the November 2014 election. The poll will also test opinions on a commercial vacancies tax, a business license tax on rental housing, and a bond and tax measure for parks. The proposed tax is a penny-per-ounce tax on drinks with added caloric sugar which would include sodas, iced teas, Italian sodas, sports and energy drinks, sweetened coffees, and sweetened ice teas. The tax would not apply to milk, milk products, alcohol or drinks that are taken for medical reasons. Many community organizations support the measure, including Latino Coalition for a Healthy California. After the community poll of 500 likely voters showed that the sugary drink tax would have ...
El Monte City School District lies about 20 miles east of the heart of Los Angeles, California. Many of its children are first-generation Mexican Americans, and 91 percent of the children participate in the free- and reduced- price lunch program. This Alliance for a Healthier Generation school has been making some big changes to the snacks it offers students in the after-school program. Many of El Monte’s students also stay at their schools until after 5 pm, participating in after school activities and athletic programs. The district offered a small after school snack of milk and fruit, but with children playing rigorous sports and expending a lot of energy, the snack wasn’t enough. Instead of getting rid of the program due to low participation, El Monte strengthened it. ...
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 ...
Many Latino families in the Rancho Cucamonga area use to be hesitant to shop at farmers' markets for fear that they would end up spending more than at a grocery store, where they could buy cheaper processed foods. Health officials, realizing this, wanted to ensure that low-income families could afford to buy fresh produce at farmers' markets by enabling them to use their Cal Fresh food benefits at the market. But they ran into another problem. "A lot of the community members that spoke Spanish said, ‘To be honest, not a lot of us take advantage of Cal Fresh,’” said Ruben Brambila, who at that time worked for the city as project manager of Healthy Kids RC. Brambila said they gave multiple reasons for not using the program, which has requirements including ...
New York's City Council has approved a bill to promote stair use and increase visibility of stairwells. According to the Center for Active Design, New York City's administrative, building, and fire code will now allow buildings to keep doors to stairwells open---thus prompting more people to take the stairs. Special magnetic devices will be used to keep doors open and in the case of an emergency, the doors will shut automatically. Incorporating any type of physical activity into one's daily routine is a great way burn some extra calories. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), taking the stairs can burn almost five times as many calories as taking the elevator. Learn more about this change here. To read the city ordinance, visit this page. ...
