In 2017, the City of Columbia received an invitation to join the second cohort of Bright Cities, a grant program to help get neurotoxic chemicals and pollutants out of the homes, childcare and outdoor play areas of the cities’ youngest and most vulnerable residents.
The Columbia Food Policy Committee partnered with the City of Columbia’s Sustainability Office to host two cooking demonstrations designed to teach parents how to cook nutritious, affordable and non-toxic meals.
Our events took place in low food access areas-Richland Library Northeast and Gable Oaks Apartments. Our goal was to share information with families about how to eat healthy while avoiding harmful toxins in food. Participating families learned from an expert panel, participated in cooking demonstrations, shared a healthy meal and received a box of locally grown organic produce. Over 35 families with young children participated in our events.
When a local grocery store suddenly closed during this time, the residents of the Gable Oaks Apartments and others in low-food access areas were significantly impacted. Community agencies collectively provided an immediate response by organizing and funding a pop-up grocery store. Over 230 families received fresh produce boxes, essential grocery store staples and nutrition education about cooking healthy and avoiding neurotoxicant chemicals in their food through education about pesticides in produce and toxic heavy metals in baby food.
The Dirty Dozen is an annual list, published by the Environmental Working Group (EWG), of 12 fruits and vegetables with the highest levels of pesticides. EWG also publishes the Clean 15, an annual list of the top 15 fruits and vegetables with the least amount of pesticides. The guides were developed after analyzing over 35,200 samples tested by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Food and Drug Administration. Both lists are helpful to take to the grocery store to know when to buy organic and when it’s ok to buy conventional.
HBBF’s recent study on heavy metals in baby food found that 95% of foods tested contain one or more toxic chemicals including lead, arsenic, mercury and cadmium. Parents were provided with HBBF’s fact sheet on safer alternatives which proved to be a helpful guide.
The City of Columbia Food Policy Committee will continue to advocate for access to healthier foods for families. It will present policy recommendations to the City Council in December 2019. Recommendations promote more opportunities for families to grow their own food and nutrition education to ensure all communities in the city have access to healthy and affordable food. They will be posted on Columbia’s website when approved.
How It Works
In 2016, HBBF launched the Bright Cities program with four cities – Seattle, Dearborn, Salt Lake City and Minneapolis. Our program has grown to include 20 cities nationwide. Bright Cities also partners with national organizations that have city and local nonprofit partnerships to provide resources to more cities more efficiently. In each community, HBBF identifies and partners with a local community-based nonprofit in addition to the city government to ensure the program is fully informed by local priorities, culture and context and is fully integrated into the community. The program consists of recruitment, assessment and analysis, strategic and tactical development and implementation. Informed by the early assessment work, each community commits to a set of actions in a negotiated, publicly supported agreement.
Resources
- Access to subject matter experts
- Policy and strategy support
- Small grants and fundraising assistance
- Fact sheets, talking points, draft policies
- Media support
- Cohort networking and best practices information
- Networking with allied local, state, national NGOs