The Hunger / Nutrition Program
The Hunger and Nutrition Program is committed to providing the community with important information on how to live a healthy life, how to access healthy foods, and to providing advocacy training, support, and leadership to attain these goals. The Program seeks to develop public and elected officials' awareness of the need for policy change to address the health effects of obesity, poor diet, and the lack of physical activity as a result of organizational and built environment issues. The Program sees advocacy as an important part of community involvement and our year-round advocacy efforts are highlighted annually by our Hunger Action Day in Sacramento. The Program trains advocates from the community to address systems and policy changes locally and to attended Hunger Action Day and speak with their legislators or their staff on specific legislation or issues that affect their communities.The newest project under Metro's Hunger and Nutrition Program is the Community Garden Project. This Project seeks to expand community gardens in the City of Fresno, giving residents a way to supplement their food resources and creating access to healthy food options in areas of the city that may not offer a variety of food choices or access to a supermarket. The Project is working with city officials and community based organizations to identify areas of the city that are underserved and where a community garden will help enhance the area and create an opportunity for neighborhoods to access healthy foods. The Project will also create a Community Garden Coalition that will allow community members and organizations to provide the latest information on gardening, available technologies, and provide a forum for the sharing of approaches, resources, and expertise.
For more information on Community Gardens, click here.
The Program is also working to assure that farmers' markets have the capability to accept EBT (Food Stamps), WIC and senior vouchers. This will increase the number of people who shop at local farmers' markets and allow outreach to those sites to increase food stamp enrollment and nutrition education.
The Program continues its work with the Summer Lunch Program using our 800 Hotline to ensure information for the current year is correct and up to date. In the Fresno Unified School District alone, 85% of the children are eligible for free lunch during the school year. Expanding the Summer Lunch Program is a way of addressing child nutrition issues when children are out of school and rely on school lunch and breakfast programs as their main source of food. Metro's Hunger and Nutrition program also seeks to expand the Universal Breakfast Program educating school officials and staff on the importance of breakfast and the different models that have been successful at other schools in the Central Valley.
The Program provides Nutrition Education to community based organizations and individuals throughout Fresno County, teaching the importance of incorporating healthy foods and snacks into their families' diet. The program also seeks to increase community knowledge on access to healthy foods.
The Program also has a Food Stamp Task Force that meets bi-monthly to discuss issues surrounding food stamp outreach and ways to increase enrollment in the county. The task group consist of the Fresno County Department of Social Services and numerous other community based organizations that all work to increase food stamp enrollment and education. The Program continues to coordinate and support the local 800 telephone number, the Food Resource Hotline, providing 24/7 referrals by zip code to Food Stamp offices, WIC, Food Pantries, Summer Lunch and Senior Meals. The Program also provides Food Stamp training with low income advocates to help others understand the advantage of Food Stamps and how to apply, and agency trainings on Food Stamp enrollment.
The Program also strives to create access to fresh fruits and vegetables in areas of the Central Valley that are underserved and have no access to these types of foods. We work to identify and establish Farmers' Market sites in neighborhoods and at schools.
The Program is also working to create a Food Policy Council that will bring together stakeholders from diverse food-related sectors to examine the food systems in place and develop recommendations on how to improve them. Along with a Food Policy Council, creating a Youth Food Policy Council that will provide a youth perspective on solving the Valley's food system issues is also part of our current planning.
For resources related to:
- Farm To School, click here.
- Building Healthy Environments, click here.
