Food Revival

Okay call me crazy, but I think Birmingham should make the MOST out of our recent Food Truck controversy. If you aren't familiar with the story, here's a link to an article in today's Birmingham News:

Now that you are up to speed, I'd like to introduce you to some REALLY awesome things happening in Boston. For one, the mayor is challenging vendors to compete in a Food Truck Challenge specifically looking at ways to promote healthy eating. Read about it here. But there's more...Boston's doctors are also prescribing produce to patients, which you can read about here. 

What does Birmingham's recent Food Truck controversy have to do with all of this Boston talk? Well, I think we are in the perfect position to make the most out of the current situation by using examples from across the country to get our city leaders' attention.  Now, I know that food trucks need to remain diverse, authentic, and trust me when I say I'm all for tacos, burgers, and fried anything. I don't want ANYONE to think that every food truck in our county should follow strict dietary guidelines and *only* offer healthy solutions. BUT, I do think that since we also happen to live in a state that ranks as the second most obese state in the nation, maybe having a couple of health(ier) food trucks dishing out some alternative dishes every now and then wouldn't be the worst idea in the world. 

There are so many things our county is trying to do to reduce obesity specifically and if Operation New Birmingham wants to figure out a way to work with Spoonfed Grill Food Truck,  why not pitch a healthy food truck initiative similar to Boston while we are at it? Let's face it: Food Trucks are celebrated all over the country and Birmingham isn't necessarily known for being on the cutting edge side of things so it might take us a second to catch up. Why not do some research, find some best practices, and offer up some innovative ideas as we go?

Every single week, I work with some amazing Health Action community partners and we are:
Developing a formal Food Policy Council and a formal Food Charter.
Working on Farm 2 School initiatives in all 12 school districts
Developing ways to get fresh produce delivered to our food pantries
Developing better standards and practices for sourcing and distributing healthy snacks at our child care centers and in our after school programs.
This is truly happening right now in Jefferson County. We can't operate in a vacuum and I personally think there's enough work to go around. 

I think a "healthy food truck initiative" is a *great* example of how we can all chip in and have really cool ideas come out of some really unfortunate misunderstandings. So while we are on the subject of food trucks, why not send our ideas to our city officials, our mayor, and Operation New Birmingham? Tell them we'd support a healthy food truck initiative and we will continue to support food trucks currently operating in and around the city (assuming, of course, they've been approved by safety and health regulations). Sorry, but I mean...one of my main partnerships is with the Health Department and I know why these rules exist. 

So what do you think, food folks? Do you think connecting all of these dots could create change by highlighting some awesome food? Or, do you think it will be a hard sell because patrons might not flock to healthier alternatives (story of my current job and life, btw). Just thought we could start a dialogue and hopefully find a way to make the most of the headlines rather than use it as yet another excuse to defend our apathy and overall distrust in our city's ability to adopt innovative ideas. 

For many of you following me on Food Revival, Facebook, and Twitter, you probably saw the writing on the wall before I did. I've been going ninety-to-nothing since getting my new job in January. For those of you who are new to Food Revival, I'm coordinating a four-year grant in Jefferson County, Alabama aimed at fighting childhood obesity.