REACH
Racial & Ethnic Approaches to Community Health
The Racial and Ethnic Approaches to Community Health (REACH) program is one of the only CDC programs that explicitly focuses on reducing chronic diseases for specific racial and ethnic groups in urban, rural, and tribal communities with high disease burden.
Since 1999, REACH has been at the forefront of CDC’s efforts to address racial and ethnic disparities in health. In September 2018, the Community Alliance for Research and Engagement (CARE) at Southern Connecticut State University was one of 31 organizations funded by CDC across the country to address racial and ethnic health disparities.
REACH in New Haven
The local REACH program in New Haven is focused on reducing health disparities among Black and Latinx residents, with a particular focus on low-income neighborhoods. We do this through culturally tailored interventions to address nutrition, physical activity, and links between clinical partners and the community. Below are some examples of what we plan to do to address these health disparities for African American, Black, Latinx, and Hispanic residents of New Haven.
Nutrition
Healthy Food Access
We are actively working to establish healthy nutrition standards in New Haven food pantries. Currently, we are implementing Supporting Wellness at Pantries (SWAP), a nutrition ranking system that categorizes items offered in food pantries, encouraging clients to make healthier choices. Additionally, we are working with local food pantries and #GiveHealthy to incentivize the purchase of fresh fruit and vegetables.
Coordinated Food Assistance Network
Coordinated Food Assistance Network (CFAN) is a working group in New Haven, focused on creating a unified system of food assistance that ensures equitable, dignified, and culturally appropriate access to nutritious food for all residents of Greater New Haven. CFAN works on collaboratively developing a strategy to address gaps in the food assistance system in New Haven. These meetings are open to the public, if you’d like to attend or learn more about CFAN, please contact Alycia Santilli.
Through CFAN’s work, we have created the Food Resource Guide, a verified directory of emergency food providers in New Haven.
Community Food Systems Hub
Led by CitySeed, this project is establishing a food hub that is committed to food justice, environmental preservation and justice, equitable economic development, and community building. The Community Food Systems Hub will be the nexus of urban food and agriculture in the New Haven area.
Breastfeeding
Our goal is to provide community support for Black mom’s breastfeeding. We use with lactation support services, trained pediatric providers, and communication materials to inform the surrounding community on why breastfeeding is important. Currently, we are in the process of hiring a lactation Peer Counselor through Yale New Haven Hospital. We are also partnering with New Haven WIC to identify and overcome barriers to breastfeeding for Black moms in New Haven.
Physical Activity
Safe Routes for All
Together with the City of New Haven Department of Traffic, Transportation and Parking and a tactical urbanism engineering firm, Street Plans, we launched Safe Routes for All. This project’s goal is to make active transportation (walking, biking, taking the bus) easier for residents to safely and easily reach their destinations. We began with a series of 6 demonstration projects in the neighborhoods of Fair Haven, West Rock, Dixwell, Dwight, Newhallville, and the Hill in August and September of 2019. The goal for each project was to increase safety by slowing traffic, reducing the distance that pedestrians had to cross, and by expanding and improving space for active transportation users. These projects reflect best practices to make streets safer and serve as a model as the City of New Haven develops an active transit master plan.
Active Transportation Plan
This plan is a comprehensive set of strategies to ensure better options for biking, walking, and transit, resulting in a street by street plan for the City of New Haven. Part of building this plan is understanding areas that need improvement, specifically related to missing pavement markings, signage, pedestrian signals, and sidewalk ramps.
We invite residents to report these issues here. Items logged on SeeClickFix, as well as feedback from Alders, Complete Streets information, and other data will inform the City of New Haven Active Transit Master Plan.
Fair Haven’s Safe Routes for All Demonstration Project, August 2019
Community-Clinical Linkages
The goal of our community-clinical linkages work is to promote programs that connect health centers with community supports, so that people access the resources they need to be healthy.
Partnering with Project Access-New Haven, a Community Health Worker is stationed in two local New Haven food pantries to screen interested clients for their needs, related to the social determinants of health. This screening process allows the Community Health Worker to navigate clients to services related to food, transportation, housing, utilities, and medical needs. Clients are asked questions to identify what services are needed, what services they received, and if they did not receive services, was there a notable barrier to them receiving the service. This information allows CARE to address the reported needs at a systems level with its local organizational partners, when possible.
Read about how CARE has collaborated to address the transportation barrier here.