This report highlights exciting trends in the Fair Food Network's Double Up Food Bucks (DUFB) program. DUFB provides low-income consumers who receive Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) funds (formerly known as food stamps) with the means to purchase more locally grown produce by matching up to $20 spent per market visit at participating sites. Highlights from the evaluation include increased purchasing of fruits and vegetables amoung consumers and an economic boost at farmers' markets.

The Reinvestment Funds’s (TRF) New Markets Tax Credit (NMTC) program funds community and economic development projects in distressed communities by leveraging private-sector equity and loan capital investment into community development projects to stimulate economic growth and create jobs in the areas that most need it. TRF’s allocations have provided a combination of debt and equity to three project types, each in highly distressed areas in the mid-Atlantic: charter schools, full service supermarkets, and other commercial and mixed-use developments. This fact sheet highlights some examples of their food access projects:

Hunts Point Produce Market, located in the South Hunts Bronx, receives premium fruits and vegetables daily from 49 states and 55 countries, and provides 60 percent of New York City's produce. Every day a fleet of trucks delivers the market's fresh food throughout the five boroughs, yet only a miniscule amount gets distributed to the South Bronx, a community underserved by traditional supermarkets and green grocers. This article discusses several city programs that are improving healthy food access in areas like the South Bronx and suggests improvements for greater impactful change.

Actor and humanitarian Wendell Pierce talks about his new fresh and wholesome grocery store named Sterling Farms in a radio interview with blackamericaweb.com. Located in his hometown of New Orleans, Pierce is hoping to revitalize the local economy and bring the community together. 

ChangeLab Solutions developed “Food as a Catalyst for Change,” a case study exploring efforts to rebuild the food system in Birmingham. Learn about local efforts to build healthy food enterprises in the region and to glean lessons for other cities and towns.

ChangeLab Solutions developed this Model Healthy Food System Resolution to help community members and policymakers start their own conversation about how the local government can support a healthier food system. It suggests numerous actions that the local government could take to understand the local food system, and it establishes a Food Policy Council to continue the food system dialogue after the resolution is enacted.

Community groups and local governments often spend money needlessly trying to conform to the wishes of developers and political leaders, rather than being able to set the terms of the development discussion to  address local food visions. One of the key issues is the calculation of an economic multiplier for proposed projects. In this column, Ken Meter offers some perspectives from his work with local officials on how to  frame the multiplier issue, and how simpler estimates might be calculated. 

The Circle Food Store, a New Orleans landmark heavily damaged in Hurricane Katrina, will be coming back. A groundbreaking ceremony was held to dedicate the rebuilding of the famous store.

Limited retail access to healthy foods affects the dietary patterns and health outcomes of many Americans.  In this webinar, speakers discuss how new research and evaluation practices are helping to generate innovative solutions that stimulate change in local communities. * Sign up here to be alerted when the new Grocery Gap is released.

There are a number of policy options available to catalyze grocery store and supermarket development in food deserts, but most require outlays of public funds. In a fiscally-constrained situations policymakers and advocates seeking funds for these programs must articulate and quantify the full range of societal benefits that grocery stores will bring. This article explores enhanced residential property values as one such benefit and uses data from Oakland, California and a hedonic price model to estimate that proximity to a grocery store adds $20,000 to $30,000 to home values. This increase in value represents increased wealth for homeowners and an expanded property tax base for governments. (Article starts on page 5).