Mar 20, 2020 | Impact, Mini-Grant Projects, News
Off I-85 in the Upstate is Pelzer, SC, a small community located in a food desert. While many associate this corridor with the City of Greenville, a vibrant metropolitan area, there are communities in the county that don’t have resources like grocery stores within a reasonable distance or the transportation to get there.
Pelzer is one of those rural, tight-knit communities that’s rich in family history and a church of nearly 200 members that cares deeply for others. Shady Grove Baptist Church built a church garden to nurture its members and community members. The church garden has been there for a few years now, getting bigger each planting season with enough fresh vegetables to feed more than one hundred families.
“Oh, my goodness! We have had so much. Our goal was for the food to be given to our senior citizens and people in the community who are in need. Truly, we have done that,” said Mamie Mills Reid,
Ministry Development Coordinator. “Just this year (2019) alone, we have given over 150 packages of vegetables. We had people come to the church and get what they wanted. We gave away food at two other locations. It’s just been so productive.”
It has taken a few years for the church to get the garden where it is now. With the help of technical assistance from LiveWell Greenville and grants from Gardens for Good and Eat Smart Move More South Carolina, the church family created a large garden, helped reduce food insecurity for many families, and encouraged members to adopt a healthy lifestyle, which has helped some overcome health issues.
Laying the Foundation
Years ago, Shady Grove joined LiveWell at Worship, a focus area of LiveWell Greenville that supports congregations in creating healthier worship environments through healthy eating and active living initiatives. It was through this initiative that Shady Grove leaders started their mission to provide congregants with opportunities to make healthy choices at church.
They adopted policies, such as water only, no fried foods at church-hosted meals, and no saltshakers on tables. Every third Sunday, they host health screenings. Leaders have also incorporated walking into the mix by participating in the Alzheimer’s Walk.
“Our pastor invites congregants to walk with him. You would be surprised at the number of people who walk with him. We had about 35 people at the last walk,” said Mamie. “It’s for three purposes: it’s for Alzheimer’s; it’s for comradery; and it’s for the exercise.”
The Garden
During a LiveWell Greenville meeting, Mamie and her pastor heard about a grant opportunity from Gardens for Good. They knew the church was in a food desert and they wanted to do something to help the community, so they applied in 2015 and received the grant to build raised bed gardens.
“Our people here don’t have transportation and they can’t go to the grocery stores and get fresh food but we thought it would be such an excellent thing to actually grow the fresh produce on the campus, and let our people partake of it,” said Mamie.
The garden helps provide nutritious food to the community and shows the younger people where vegetables come from. “They don’t come from Publix. They don’t come from Bi-Lo and Ingles. They come from the ground,” said Mamie. “So, it has been a wonderful teaching experience for them. My husband has taken our younger men and ladies down to the garden and they have participated in the growing.”
Skip ahead to 2018 when Shady Grove heard about an ESMMSC grant opportunity at a LiveWell Greenville meeting. They decided to press their luck and apply for a Let’sGo 3.0 mini-grant.
“We had already started working on the garden, but this grant allowed us to purchase tools and other things that we needed,” said Mamie.
The tools made working in the garden easier. Anyone who has kept a garden, knows that a lot of time and effort goes into cultivating the soil, watering the plants, pulling weeds, and harvesting the crops. Add the hot Carolina sun in there, and that makes for a long day.
“I hope at some point we can use it as a tool with our younger generations to get more interest in gardening and healthy eating. And just getting them more interested in working,” said Janie Reid, church member and garden volunteer. “When it comes to a community garden, the Biblical saying is true: The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. It’s hard to make yourself get out there in 90-degree weather and pull the Bermuda grass and water the garden.”
Changing Lives
Eating a healthy, balanced diet and getting exercise are key elements to living a healthy life. And that’s what the LiveWell at Worship initiative and the garden have done for many church members – it’s changing lives.
Gail Canty is a church member and benefactor not only of the garden, but also of the entire health and wellness program. She grew up eating fried foods and drinking sugar-sweetened beverages, even though she ate from the garden her father tended. As an adult, she developed Type 2 diabetes.
“It’s good that we have baked foods, more salads, and don’t go heavy on the carbs at church. It’s helped me a lot to keep my diabetes in control. With lifestyle changes, for me, I don’t have to take any medication at this point. I’m been off diabetes medication for almost a year. For me, I attribute it to eating better and walking.
“Since we are a wellness church, we do the chair exercises and other things to keep moving, and I think that helped me. It motivates me to continue those healthy rituals when I’m at home.
“We have nurses here at church who encourage us to drink water. That motivated me to switch from juices to water. I’m not a soda drinker, but I was a juice drinker. Even at church events, they have bottled water and that helps me. If I’m going to do it here, I may as well do it at home.”
Shady Grove Baptist Church isn’t just looking out for their own. They seek out people who aren’t members of the church to feed. “Just about everyone in this community belongs to Shady Grove, but I know that there was a disabled members’ neighbor who was not a member of this church, and she would always benefit from the garden. We have another lady who is widowed, and we make sure she gets vegetables. So, we do identify anyone who is 65 or older and we make sure they benefit from the garden,” said Janie.
The entire wellness program at Shady Grove Baptist Church seems to be a great success. From guest speakers, walks, and health screenings to the garden, fellowship, and youth engagement, the people of Shady Grove are truly making healthy change happen for their community.
“It’s such an opportunity for the church and the community to grow in a different area other than just spiritual because the spiritual makes the physical. These bodies are supposed to be tended to very well,” said Janie.
Mar 20, 2020 | Impact, Mini-Grant Projects, News
Eat Smart Move More South Carolina (ESMMSC) is pleased to announce $30, 944.81 has been awarded to eight communities in the Lowcountry, Midlands, Pee Dee and Upstate regions of the state. For the past two-and-a-half years, ESMMSC has been funding communities around the state to increase access to healthy food and safe places for physical activity.
“This application round was the largest response we’ve received yet, which makes choosing the recipients more difficult,” said Kelsey Allen, Manager of Community Initiatives at ESMMSC. “We received 53 applications that were all deserving of funding, but we only had enough funds to award eight communities this time.”
Reviewers, located around the state, judge applications using set criteria, such as policy, system, and environmental change; health equity, underserved populations, and community accessibility, and community impact. For applications that were not accepts, technical assistance is provided, and, oftentimes, applicants are connected to ESMMSC partners who can help move the project along.
In June 2020, the application for the final round of mini-grants will open. Funding is made possible by The BlueCross® BlueShield® of South Carolina Foundation, an independent licensee of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association.
Round 4 Grant Recipients
Carolina Youth Development Center (CYDC) will plant a campus garden to serve its residents and the community. The goal is to implement a self-sustaining project that will allow kids to plant and grow food, process it in CYDC’s DHEC-certified commercial kitchen facility, and ultimately, sell it through a partnership with Lowcountry Street Grocery, an organization that delivers a mobile market to food deserts in the greater Charleston community. CYD will also partner with the Green Heart Project, which will design a garden space on CYDC’s to initially include seven raised garden beds. They will also use Green Heart Project’s science-based curriculum to engage residents in an after-school activity that teaches farm-to-table production.
Fort Lawn Community Center is partnering with the Town of Fort Lawn, Community Heart and Soul Team, and Eat Smart Move More Chester County to make improvements to a local playground, making it more user-friendly for youth and families. This idea is one of the findings during a walkability study. In addition, the Community Heart and Soul team interviewed hundreds of residents and visitors to the Fort Lawn and concluded that a major concern is a lack of recreational facilities. This project will encourage greater use of the playground by individuals and families through better signage, revamped edging and mulch for equipment, and improvements to parking. Plans include adding signage on major roads and in neighborhoods, purchasing and installing edging, mulch, and rock during a volunteer project day, publicizing the improvements, and determining a method for tracking usage of the playground.
Ladies Divine to Shine will convene a Healthy Young People Empowerment (HYPE) team to engage youth leaders in creating a food policy council representing Lamar, SC and its surrounding communities. The HYPE Team will conduct activities to promote more consumption of fruits and vegetables, decreasing consumption of sugar-sweetened drinks, decreasing unhealthy snacks and reducing portion size and increasing physical activity. They will also conduct a healthy eating and physical activity assessment of the area, as well as lead physical activities for students during the summer months.
The Town of Paxville will renovate Paxville Community Park to make it accessible and inclusive for all residents. The intention of this project is to facilitate increased and diverse usage of the park as well as to encourage healthy living habits and fellowship among community members. While some of the park features are usable, the park as a whole does not currently present itself as a modern or inspiring space for the public to utilize or gather. This park project reflects the growing needs and interests of the community to cater to a young and rural population by offering modern, mixed-use, and health-oriented services. In parallel, the town is also conducting the process to obtain its own ambulance.
The Saluda High School HYPE Team will focus on improving Brooks and Rand Memorial Park, or “The Field.” Over the years, the park has been neglected. It no long has electricity and service. The park equipment is old, unusable, and unsafe. Tall grass, litter, and graffiti now pollute the area. The students believe that restoring and revitalizing the park will provide a safer and more accessible outlet for community members to get out and become physically active. The HYPE team will partner with community leaders and volunteers to install signage, replace benches and basketball goals. Other park improvements will be implemented that can lead to longer-standing changes in the Brooks and Roston Memorial Park and surrounding community.
The South Carolina School for the Deaf and Blind Foundation (SCSDBF) wants to build upon its Pathways to Healthy Living Initiative by installing water refill stations on its campus, which will not only impact the students and faculty, but also the surround community that uses the Fluor Field House for physical activity. This project will resolve a safety issue for students who have difficulty using current water fountains from 1969. In addition to installing new and modern water refill stations, SCSDBF will use the funds to retrofit some water fountains with a water bottle refill fitting. By installing both new and retrofitted bottle filling stations, SCSDBF will make it easier for students, staff, and community members to adopt the healthy habit of drinking fresh water
St. James-Santee Elementary/Middle School will intentionally reach a pocket of Charleston County that has limited resources by installing inclusive playground equipment and bicycle stands, providing bicycle locks, and building a bike trail to connect the school campus to nearby trailheads. School leaders will also strengthen their open community use policy to allow parents/caregivers and their children to use the playground and biking trail during the weekends, school breaks, and summer. The project, in partnership with the Town of McClellanville and Francis Marion National Forest, will address community needs by providing free opportunities and easily-accessible space for the community to be active.
Keystone Substance Abuse Services will improve an existing walking path located on its campus. The walking path us rundown and not fully paved, oftentimes ending up as a mud pit after rainfall. The walking trail loops from the front of the building to the back of the building and creates an approximate .25 mile loop, and it’s the only recreation space that patients can access. Funding will support the pavement of the trail to allow our patients more access to a walking trail to increase physical activity. Evidence shows that physical activity can help provide structure, generate positivity, distract from cravings, and heal the body and brain. Long term plans include creating fitness stations for patients and staff to increase overall wellness for individuals.
Jan 30, 2020 | Advocacy & Policy, Blog, PSE Approach & Strategies
Have you attended an Eat Smart Move More South Carolina (ESMMSC) meeting or event and felt annoyed that your only beverage options were water and unsweetened tea? Or that your only food options were salads, wraps, or grilled chicken? There’s a reason for that! ESMMSC has a Healthy Meetings and Wellness Policy that supports its mission and work: to advance community-led change to reduce obesity, by making the healthy choice the easy choice for every South Carolinian.
Many organizations and businesses are implementing healthy meetings and events practices. To send the message that health is important to them, to help support the health of the employees, members, and partners, and to have more energized and engaged participants, organizations and businesses should adopt healthy meetings and events policies too.
“If we served sugar-sweetened beverages, fried foods, and went heavy on refined carbs at our meetings and events where food is served, it would completely go against everything our organization stands for,” said Meg Stanley, executive director at ESMMSC. “We care about the health of everyone we come in contact with, so it just makes sense to have these types of policies in place and to implement them.”
Far too often, organizations and businesses serve unhealthy breakfast, lunch, and snack foods at conferences and meetings. And that’s easy to do when there aren’t policies in place that provide guidelines.
“For example, if you’re a health insurance company and your mission, in part, is to keep healthcare costs down, serving fried chicken at a meeting makes it hard to say you’re staying true to your mission,” says Stanley. “The same is true for any business, small or large. If you care about employee health and wellness, you should have a policy in place and enforce that policy.”
Since its inception in 2007, ESMMSC has maintained and implemented a Healthy Meetings and Wellness Policy: Given our mission to make the healthy choice the easy choice for every South Carolinian, ESMMSC aims to create a workplace that promotes and supports healthy lifestyles for both employees and partners. As such, ESMMSC has adopted the following wellness policies: Healthy Meetings and Catering, Movement Meetings, Physical Activity Opportunities, Sharing Food, and Staff Wellness.
Each of these policies provides opportunities to those who attend ESMMSC meetings and events, as well as staff, to eat healthy foods and to engage in healthy activities. Download the ESMMSC policy.
“I’ll be honest, when I started working at ESMMSC eight years ago, I wasn’t thrilled about the policies, but I’ve come to appreciate them. They make me accountable for my health and wellness,” says Brandie Freeman, communications and marketing manager at ESMMSC. “With these policies in place, I drink more water, snack on fruits instead of chips and candy, and have managed to eat more vegetables with my meals. I mean, I’m not perfect. I still indulge, but I don’t do it quite so often.”
If your organization or business would like to adopt a Healthy Meetings and Wellness Policy, there are a couple of reputable resources available online. You can also contact ESMMSC.
- The American Heart Association’s Healthy Workplace Food and Toolkit
- Center for Science in the Public Interest’s Healthy Meetings Resources
Adopting a Healthy Meetings and Wellness Policy is a great way to highlight the culture of health within your organization or business and be part of the growing movement around health and wellness. For more information, contact Executive Director Meg Stanley at meg@eatsmartmovemoresc.org or Manager of Policy and Advocacy Phil Ford at phil@eatsmartmovemoresc.org.
Jan 30, 2020 | Advocacy & Policy, Blog, PSE Approach & Strategies
Whether you realize it or not, you’ve probably been advocating for things throughout your life. Did you ask your parents for a pet and give them reasons why you deserve one? Have you ever asked your boss for a raise and explained why you deserve it? What about raising concerns about your loved one’s healthcare with their provider? If you answered yes to any of these questions, then you are an advocate.
Advocacy is an activity by an individual or group that aims to influence decisions within political, economic, and social systems and institutions. Advocacy is presenting a problem or a need to elected officials, and it’s almost always accompanied by a solution.
“One thing my mom used to tell me growing up: don’t just come to me with a problem. Come to me with a solution as well,” says Phil Ford, manager of policy and advocacy. “It’s important for legislators to be made aware of the problem but it’s even more important to let them know that you want to work with them to find an appropriate solution.”
Advocacy is, perhaps, the most effective way to make change happen on any level of government because the issues directly impact the day to day lives of every citizen in a town or county – not to mention the state.
Communicating with your elected officials is important. They often only hear from constituents when they need something. It’s just as important to thank them for a vote on a bill or resolution, or for standing with you on the issues.
“Don’t be afraid to contact your decision-makers. They often hear from constituents only when something is needed, but they’re not recognized when they do the “right” thing. So, when you notice a decision-maker who’s done the “right” thing, thank them and let them know,” says Ford.
Everyone can advocate. Whether it’s asking your own legislator for support or only distributing facts to elected officials, every individual has the right to advocate. Use our Steps to Effective Advocacy handout to guide you through your next advocacy campaign. For a further explanation of advocacy, download our What is Advocacy handout.
Feb 18, 2019 | HYPE Civic Action Projects, News
Eat Smart Move More South Carolina (ESMMSC) is partnering
with the 7th Episcopal District of the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church
to teach teens about the Healthy Young People Empowerment (HYPE) Project and to
help guide them through a public health project that focuses on healthy eating
and/or active living in their churches or communities. Up to ten HYPE teams from
the AME’s Young People’s Division (YPD) programs around the state will be
selected to receive up to $1,000 each to implement their project.
“Providing our youth with opportunities to form leadership
skills and to then use those skills throughout life to better their church and
communities is what our YPD is all about,” said Dr. Ila McFadden, YPD Director
at the 7th Episcopal District of the AME Church. “The HYPE Project will
influence our youth to become leaders in public health and to consider health
equity as being just as important as all other inequities in life.”
Currently, African-Americans experience disparities in
access to healthy and affordable foods and safe places for physical activity,
which are key factors in reducing obesity. To help rectify such disparities, selected
HYPE teams will help their churches and communities by completing projects,
such as community gardens, advocating for healthy eating and/or active living
policies with their church, disability and inclusion for physical activity
spaces, and healthy concessions/vending.
“The faith community has a long history of meeting the needs
of their congregations and local communities, and this is especially true for
African-American churches,” said Trimease K. Carter, Manager of Youth
Engagement at ESMMSC. “This means the AME church will have an even larger
impact on health equity and youth development.”
The 7th District covers all of South Carolina with close to 675
churches and 556 YDP organizations. The YPD program reaches more than 6,600 youth in South Carolina. Their focus it to provide meaningful
youth training programs and opportunities for leadership experience in all
areas of church life, as well as to advocate for the integrity of childhood and
the dignity of all children and youth in the religious, civic, and political
structure.
“Our partnership with the AME Church seems like a natural fit
because we both have missions that address increasing opportunities for those
in need in our communities. We’re looking forward to working with these youth
and forging a great partnership with the 7th Episcopal District of the AME
Church,” said Carter.
Once the HYPE teams are selected, ESMMSC will provide the
HYPE curriculum training at the YPD Retreat on March 8 in Columbia. Afterwards,
the teams will return home and begin the process of choosing their project,
working with church and community leaders, and implementing their plans.
For more information about the AME partnership, visit our youth engagement page.
