Baltimore City, Maryland faces many of the same food system opportunities and challenges of other post-industrial cities, but the municipal government is aggressively pursuing a “food in all policies” approach by engaging agencies throughout the city. This feature highlights the initial efforts that established this approach, including an effort to institutionalize intergovernmental collaboration, and a few of the subsequent policies aimed at improving food access and supporting urban agriculture throughout the city.

This report shows the numerous economic benefits to the state of Maryland that the Red Line and the Purple Line would deliver. Each tangible benefit tells just one piece of the full story of these projects. Taken together, the evidence is overwhelming that the Red and Purple Lines are a vital investment in Maryland’s future.

Officials in cities across the nation are launching their own healthy food policy initiatives designed to bring healthier food options into their communities. Baltimore offers an important example of a city that has successfully implemented an inter-governmental initiative to increase access to healthy and affordable foods in underserved neighborhoods. This webinar offers an in-depth exploration of Baltimore’s healthy food retail programs and accomplishments including its virtual supermarket program, the financing of two recent healthy food markets, and a just released study mapping food quality in Baltimore food markets.

A profile on Liberty Heights ShopRite located in the West Baltimore neighborhood of Howard Park. The supermarket is a joint venture by two seasoned ShopRite operators, Jeff Brown and the Klein family. The partnership will combine the Klein family’s 90 year background of owning and operating stores in suburban Maryland and Jeff Brown’s experience in running urban-based stores in the Philadelphia region. The project also stands as an example of a successful partnership involving Baltimoreans United in Leadership Development (BUILD), Baltimore Development Corporation (BDC), the Howard Park Civic Association, Calvin Rodwell Elementary School’s Child First Afterschool Program, Klein Family Markets, UpLift Solutions, Opportunity Finance Network (OFN), City First Bank, JPMorgan Chase and The Reinvestment Fund (TRF).

Michele and Erich March, part-owners of the March Funeral Homes in Baltimore, are taking a 180-degree turn to ready a new business venture in East Baltimore: a grocery store called Apples and Oranges.It will offer fresh fruits, veggies, meats and fish, and an array of freshly prepared, healthy foods made daily by a chef who said he knows what it is like to grow up in a community where sodas, French fries, lake trout sandwiches and fried chicken boxes have ruled for years.

In an area where fresh foods are not readily accessible, the opening of a new supermarket is music to the ears of residents in the East Baltimore community near Broadway and North Avenue.Six years in the planning, this weekend marks the grand opening of the new Apples and Oranges.Owners are positioning the market as one that will not only offer healthier foods but will serve as a resource on how to eat healthier as well. Community leaders hope this will attract other businesses to the city.

A profile on Apples and Oranges Fresh Market (A&O Market), a supermarket that sells fresh and healthy prepared foods. This minority-owned supermarket is at the nexus of three Limited Supermarket Access (LSA) areas in East Baltimore, which collectively have an unmet grocery demand of $26.4 million based on The Reinvestment Funds’s 2011 LSA research.

More than a third of Baltimore neighborhoods don't have ready access to healthy foods, leaving one in five residents to rely on high-fat, high-calorie meals from corner stores and carryout restaurants, a new assessment shows. City officials and other groups already are launching programs to provide healthier eating options for Baltimoreans.

The Baltimore Food Policy Initiative is an inter-governmental collaboration with the Department of Planning, Baltimore Office of Sustainability, Baltimore Development Corporation and the Baltimore City Health Department. The goal of BFPI is to increase access to healthy and affordable foods in Baltimore City food deserts. BFPI is doing this through a holistic and comprehensive food systems approach.