Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010

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> Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010
> The recent passage of the $4.5 billion Child Nutrition Reauthorization bill will increase opportunities for parks and recreation agencies to better serve children across America. The Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010, S. 3307, increases funding for afterschool and summer feeding programs and contains provisions for physical activity, nutrition and close-to-home food sources such as community gardens. Here are some excerpted sections of the legislation:
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> Gives priority to projects that: (1) make local food products available on school menus; (2) serve a high proportion of children who are eligible for free or reduced price lunches; and (3) incorporate experiential nutrition education by involving school children in farm and garden-based agricultural education activities.
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> Authorizes appropriations for FY2011-FY2015 for the pilot program for high-poverty schools, which provides grants to nonprofit or public entities to develop and run community gardens at high-poverty schools to provide students with hands-on vegetable gardening and nutrition education.
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> Expands an afterschool supper program – now offered in Washington, D.C. and 13 other states – to all states. Doing so would provide an additional 21 million meals annually. (This provision would allow eligible community recreation centers to provide children participating in evening activities with supper)
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> Note: The increased funding in the Child Nutrition Reauthorization bill was originally going to be offset by decreasing natural resources conservation programs in the Dept. of Agriculture, which oversees the Child Nutrition program, but legislators rejected the idea and instead decreased funding in the food stamp program. Conservation programs such as WHIP and WRP have benefited parks and recreation agencies who work with the agriculture community to protect waterways and valuable wildlife habitat.