planning for healthy neighborhoods1

8/7/2019 Planning for Healthy Neighborhoods1

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/planning-for-healthy-neighborhoods1 1/13

Planning for Healthy NeighborhoodsIncluding Healthy Food Infrastructure in the EIS/EA

Process

Environmental Impact Assessment

GEOG 5960

Alexandra ParvazApril 27, 2010

GEOG 5963University of Utah



This paper seeks to explore and analyze a recommendation made on behalf of the

President of the Manhattan Borough that local governments, city planners and policy

makers should consider more proactive measures towards ensuring community health and

well-being through the lens of the city planning, zoning and the development permit

process (1. Stringer, 4th paragraph) . By carefully examining how our cities are designed

and how the built environment or proposed development projects can exacerbate

problems such as obesity/diabetes epidemics, we can better understand local

environmental factors and apply measures to manage and take a preventative medicine

approach.

Prevalence of Obesity and the influence of the Retail Food

Environment

Over the past two decades, the United States has followed a sobering trajectory

towards an unhealthy diet crisis. As shown below in the graph composed by the Centers

of Disease Control, one can see that the incidence of obesity has dramatically increased

in some states that have rapidly escalated from an initial 10% incidence to a startling near

25-30% prevalence in only 18 years (“Overweight and Obesity”). Nearly one third

of all US children and adolescents are considered overweight, having more than doubled

since the 1970s by enhancing morbidity and mortality in the U.S, obesity has become

the second leading preventable cause of disease and death in the United States, secondonly to tobacco use (Wang, 22). Out of all 50 states, Mississippi has emerged by far as

the most obese state in the country (“Mississippi tops U.S. Obesity Ranking”). The map

below provides a shocking illustration of the expanse of the disease.



Figure 1. Source: CDC Behavioral Risk Surveillance System

Another alarming health trends is the increasing rates of diabetes, in particular

type 2 diabetes, a chronic version of the disease which for many people who suffer from

it, develop the disease due to lifestyle habits an. Excessive consumption of unhealthy,

highly processed sugary foods, inactivity and excess weight gain all enhance one’s risk

for developing the diseases as well as several other severe illnesses like coronary heart,

cancer, arthritis and hypertension. Nearly 23 million Americans, 7% of the entire

population suffers from the illness, and ranked the seventh leading cause of death in the

U.S in 2006 (“Diabetes Statistics”, Segal paragaph 3).

As one analyzes these disconcerting health profiles, one detects health disparities

among income, race and the incidence of the disease. Rates of disease prevalence have

been highest among people of color and low-income status. Between 2006-2008, African

Americans were more likely to develop obesity than any other race, with 51% higher

prevalence than Caucasians. Some of the contributing factors that have led to these

1999

2008

1990

No Data <10% 10%–14% 15%–19%

0%

Obesity Trends* Among U.S. Adults

BRFSS, 1990, 1999, 2008



trends include cost of food items to the point where fresh produce is more expensive than

the less nutritious, highly processed food. In one instance, according to the US

Department of Agriculture, between the years of 1985 and 2000, the cost of fruits and

vegetables jumped to over 120 percent, while soft drinks, fats, sugars and sweets only

increased by less than 50 percent, hence creating a preference for the unhealthy. Cultural

factors also contributes to the trends, referring to what has been called an “obesogenic”

lifestyle in America given cultural and media pressure especially among youth to increase

their consumption and portion sizes of high energy, sugary foods, but minimal physical

exercise which fosters more sedentary behavior (Wung, 24; Davidow paragraph 20).

Still, other potentially more causal factors to the epidemic include the sheer

abundance and close proximity of fast food restaurants versus healthier food options from

grocery stores with respect to an individuals’ homes. Studies have shown disparities in

the availability of fruit and vegetable purveyors especially among minority and low

income populations, revealing 50 to 70% fewer chain supermarkets compared with White

and non-Hispanic neighborhoods, contributing to the higher instance of obesity and

diabetes rates (Wung 24, “Designed for Disease”). In contrast, researchers have

increasing found about the strong association between proximity to healthy food stores in

fostering more healthy diets, and thus higher vegetable intake (Wang 24).

In an effort to examine the association between the location of food retail stores,

also known as “Food Environments” and the risks for obesity and diabetes, researchers

with the California Center for Public Health Advocacy have created an intriguing ration

called the Retail Food Environment Index, an indicator which compares the number of

fast food restaurants in addition to unhealthy convenient stores to the number of more

fresher food purveyors from either a grocery store, supermarket or farmers market. To

achieve a description number for a particular community, the number of these facilities is

counted relative to a 0.5 mile radius of a person’s home in the urban environment. If

measured in a small community, the value increases to 1 mile and if rural; a 5 mile

radius.



The equation is detailed below:

R.F.E.I. = # Fast-Food Restaurants + # Convenience Stores

#Grocery Stores + # Produce Vendors

A value of 2 would indicate that the number of fast food joints is twice as many

likely to be found nearby compared to grocery stores (Designed Disease ,2). An RFEI

below 3 is considered the low end of fast food to grocery ration, while 5 and above is

considered very high. The local R.F.E.I. for a Californian is 4.5, more than 4 times as

many fast food joints for every grocery store or produce vendor near a person’s

residence, therefore suggesting a fairly strong resource situation that explains

susceptibility to bad food choices. Studies have shown that higher RFEI are correlated

with higher prevalence of obesity and diabetes. Studies have also found had also been

conducted showing the relationship between income and the RFEI and health outcome,

revealing that low income communities, who are defined as having an income below

200% of the federal poverty level, are 20% higher compared to those in higher income

areas, showing a clear association (3, 4). To come full circle, another study testing the

relationship between prevalence of obesity and diabetes and adults with high local RFEIswho also live in low income communities, and demonstrated a correlation. Obesity

prevalence had been found to be 17% higher for lower incomes communities with

R.F.E.Is of 5 or more relative to those whose R.F.E.I.s were less than 3 (5) .

In essence, this study has well demonstrated a strong association between the

proximity of food purveyors and the options that are readily available in the community

and the prevalence of dietary illnesses (6). Hence, these studies carry great import in

arguing that a good strategy for tackling and addressing the obesity/diabetes epidemic is

to embark in improving the retail food environment and thus the shape of one’s

community and urban design/planning. In addition to educational programs and reaching

out to people to change their eating habits, more aggressive measures must seriously be

implemented in strengthening health advocacy efforts by improving the food

environments which would more directly and easily create the conditions for the public to



make healthier food selections (8, Stringer, 2).

Strategies Improving the Retail Food Environment

Some of the suggested ways to improve the retail food environment include

engaging policy makers and city planners who need to recognize how the shape of our

cities and hence the prevalence of crucial building structures such as healthy foods stores

strongly impacts our communities food choices. In this way it is necessary that

environmental and policy interventions be implemented by increasing the availability of

grocery stores and produce vendors in the following ways:

1) Enhance access to healthy foods by providing incentives and new policies to be

made for stimulating the establishment of more local fruit and vegetable markets

particularly in communities in need, the so called “food deserts”. Establish more

farmers markets

2) Change zoning rules to dis-incentivize the fast food chains in favor of

businesses that make a deliberate attempt at improving community health (7).

The Manhattan Burough local government in New York City has taken these

studies very seriously and beginning in 2009, released a proposal for the city to tackle its

own alarming dietary healthy crises by taking proactive measures in looking at the built

environment’s influence on food choices. Under the promotion of the progressive

President of the Manhattan Burough Scot Stringer, the city has employed an similar tool

to the REIF called the FoodStat to help policy makers to assess the severity of their local

food crises.

The FoodStat= # of Bodegas + # Fast food restaurants

# of Supermarkets + Produce vendors



Exactly like the REIF, the higher the FoodStat, “the worse the mix of retail food

options in a community” (Stringer 4). Among the key benefits Scott Stringer points out

of using these food climate indicators is that they help “institutionalize consideration of

the neighborhood food landscape in policies and programs developed by the City to

improve public health and the urban environment” (Stringer 5). Additionally, by

quantifying a well-known problem, FoodStat encourages the expansion of healthy food

options in neighborhoods where such options are in shortest supply and thus holds higher

standards the services and infrastructure located in any given community to promote

healthy food systems. Having comparative data across neighborhoods will help overall

raise more awareness of the defining local food landscape and help unify efforts through

policy to improve the diets of city residents (Stringer 5).

The Implications for City Planners, governmental

agencies, and augmenting the E.I.S.

With these recommendations in place, a key question to consider now is what,

then are the implications for developers and city planners? Understanding that a healthy

food infrastructure is crucial to ensure the health and quality of life of fellow residents,

Stringer has now called forth for the establishment of more proactive city planning

measures to be implemented to ensure local food systems are protected from any zoning

or development projects that could put them at risk. In this light, Stringer via his 2009

proposal entitled, Planning for Healthy Neighborhoods: Include Food

Infrastructure in the City’s Environmental Review, has announced the

need to ensure that decision-makers like the City Planning

Commission, before approving a development project in a particular

neighborhood, “should be well informed about the impacts of anydevelopment proposal on the local food system” (Stringer, 5).

In an effort to leverage the city’s commitment to enhance food

security and access to healthy produce to particularly at risk, low

income communities, he has suggested that a category called the

“Healthy Food Infrastructure” be incorporated into the City’s



Environmental Quality Review (CEQR) (“Proposal to Include Healthy Food

Infrastructure in Environmental Impact Review”). The CEQR is aprocess which

measures the negatives impact that proposed developments would have on the

surrounding neighborhood’s resources such as water and air quality and which requires

mitigation measures to be addressed. However under his recommendation, the same

consideration should be given to local food resources which should be considered as an

impact category. Inherent in this proposal is an understanding of the inextricable

linkages between the shape of any given neighborhood and the public health. Before a

permit can be granted to a proposed project in a neighborhood, here must an assessment

of whether this project will affect the communities capacity to access fresh, healthy

produce and where appropriate, identify methods to either mitigate or minimize these

effects.

As part of this assessment, prior to the developer and associated agency in

studying impacts is the first prepare either an Environmental Assessment Statement, to an

Environmental Impact Statement if the proposed development has a direct significant

impact on healthy food infrastructure. When considering where a category regarding

Local Food System impacts in the EIS, the traditional EIS structure already holds offers

several good categories to host it under, either as a subsection to the Community

Facilities, Socio-economic or public Health Sections. However, a local food systemcould be even its own section alone, and thus as Stringer says, provide “the technical and

legal basis for questioning food infrastructure during the review of new development

proprosals (2).

Some of the impacts that agencies should consider would relate to direct and

indirect effects, as detailed below (2):

• Direct effects refer to those impacts which would directly harm existing

food resources essential for healthy communities, this couls be int eh

form of displacement of food retailers or for that matter the entities

responsible for provisioning the retailers with food, such as a community

garden, urban agricultural project.



• Indirect effects relate mores o to local demand on the supply of food. If a

porejct proposes that he population increase which results in more

resource consumers, it is essential to assess whether the local food supply

can even accommodate the food pressures.

The CEQR mandates that the agency first consider thresholds to determine

whether an EA or EIS is warranted. Those projects that would be located within food

insecure neighborhoods would demand stricter scrutiny compared to that of a more

wealthy, ample food community. In addition to using the REIF indicator to determine the

type of community one would be working with and thus get an idea of the type of

analysis to do, agencies are requested to consider the total square footage of supermarket

space to total population. On average, 15,000 sq ft of supermarket space is afforded per

10,000 people. A key goal in trying to enhance local fresh food systems is the enhance

this ratio to 30,000 sq.ft/10,000 residents. In this light, agencies should identify to the

following categories (3):

1) Healthy Food Deficient Neighborhoods-areas also known as “food deserts”

where the market sq. ft. to resident ratio is well below the average. Any

population increase of at least 1% within 0.25 miles of the site would createenormous strains, hence an EIS required.

2) Healthy Food Undersupplied Neighborhoods-lack adequate healthy food

infrastructure since their citywide average of supermarkets to residents is

below the ideal of 30,000 sq ft/10,000 residents. A population increase of at

least 5% would within 0.25 mile of the site would result in significant impact

and thus warrant an EIS.

3) Healthy Food Sufficient Neighborhoods: Hence, if a neighborhood’s sq

footage to resident ratio is less than the average,

Upon identifying the type of locale to work with next steps would need to consider

factors such as the number, type and location of the food retail stores in vicinity of the

area, as well as looking into the degree of farmers markets, urban agricultural sites and



other sources of fresh food availability (3-4). Once again, critical questions to assess are

the following:

1) Will this project cause direct or indirect barriers to social interaction?

2) Impede access to neighborhoods and services?

3) Will it invoke any Loss of services?

If sever impact is detected, then mitigation measures must be addressed such as the

creation of a new healthy food supplier in the region, enhancing the fresh food supply by

implementing more farmers markets, or reserving retail space for food providers that

would be able to connect with recipients of food stamps.

Case Example:

In the city of Detroit, a region crippled by the economic downtown and suffering from

soaring unemployment rates and social despair, a former stockbroker John Hantz has

sought to help his community. Hantz has invested over $30 million to transform an

urban blighted abandoned area in the heart of the city into a thriving for-profit 50 acre

urban agricultural farm, turning the lot into the largest urban farm in the world. Among

the main goals of this project is to rejuvenate the decaying Detroit into a biologically

productive area where community members can work the land, grow fresh, local

produdc, and all the while “create a viable, beautiful environment that will enhance the

City, attract tourism, increase the tax base, create jobs and greatly improve the quality of

life in Detroit” (Hantz Farms.org). Through the creation of green jobs for Detroit citizens

to grow food year round, he envisions this project enhancing the access to fresh, healthy

produce all the while stimulating the local economy and providing jobs that offer a

livable and meaningful wage to the farmers. Although Hantz has already bought the land

and immediately seeks to hire locally full time positions for planning the area, he also

seeks to receive a free tax –delinquent land, change the zoning adjustment from

residential or commercial property to agriculture, and zoning rules to create a lower tax

rate for agriculture. (Berman paragraph 30, Whitford paragraph 32).



This case lends itself very well as a good example of a project that may need to

compose an Environmental Assessment in order to get a permit from the City of Detroit

to begin breaking ground. Since it directly relates to urban local food systems, his

agency partners would assess impacts as related to the Healthy Food Infrastructure

resource category.

Conclusion

Overall, the incorporation of a Healthy Food Infrastructure in the City Environmental

Review and for that matter an Environmental Impact Statement would offer a series of

cascading benefits in the form of creating amore holistic and comprehensive assessment

of a project’s impacts on issues which deserve attention. With increasing research

demonstrating the impacts of retail food environments on people’s food choices, we have

come to recognize the need for better designing our cities to make fresh produce more

readily accessible to communities in need. By taking more proactive measures in the

way that a City grants permits for development projects, communities can more easily

achieve the goal of more sustainable, multi-functional, elegant cities that take an

integrated approach to addressing critical social issues.



References:

Berman, Laura. John Hantz envisions vacant Detroit land as a working farm. The Detroit

News: http://www.detnews.com/article/20090723/OPINION03/907230340/1008/John-

Hantz-envisions-vacant-Detroit-land-as-a-working-farm#ixzz0mP3I2nFj, retrieved April

26, 2010.

California's Food Landscape Encourages Obesity: New Research Tools Monitors Retail

Food Environment. http://www.collectiveroots.org/node/761, retrieved April 20, 2010

Davidow, Julie. “The Obesity Crisis: A healthy diet often beyond the means of poor,

hungry” Seattle Post Intelligencer. 2004

Diabetes Statistics. American Diabetes Assocation, http://www.diabetes.org/diabetes-

basics/diabetes-statistics/ , retrieved April 23, 2010.

Designed for Disease: The Link Between Local Food Environments and Obesity and Diabetes. California Center for Public Health Advocacy, Policy Link, and the UCLACenter for Health Policy Research. April 2008.

“Mississippi tops U.S. obesity rankings” CNNHealth.com.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/07/01/obesity.rankings/index.html, retrieved

April 20, 2010

“Overweight and Obesity: Trends by State 1985-2008”. Centers for Disease Control and

Prevention. http://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data/trends.html, retrieved April 23, 2010

“Proposal to Include Healthy Food Infrastructure in Environmental Impact Review.” The

Manhattan Minute: Blogging about the Borough. http://mbpo.org/blog_details.asp?

id=178&page=1, retrieved April 20, 2010.

Segal, Laura. “America’s Obesity Epidemic Getting Worse. New Report Finds

Adult Obesity Rates Up in 31 States; The South is the ‘Biggest Belt’”. Trust for

America’s Health. August 29, 2006

Stringer, Scott M. FoodStat: Measuring the Retail Food Environment in NYC

Neighborhoods. Manhattan Borough President Proposal. May 2009

Stringer, Scott. M, Planning for Healthy Neighborhoods: Include Food

Infrastructure in the City’s Environmental Review. President of the Borough of

Manhattan Proposal. June 2009

http://www.detnews.com/article/20090723/OPINION03/907230340/1008/John-Hantz-envisions-vacant-Detroit-land-as-a-working-farm#ixzz0mP3I2nFj


http://www.collectiveroots.org/node/761

http://www.diabetes.org/diabetes-basics/diabetes-statistics/


http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/07/01/obesity.rankings/index.html


http://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data/trends.html


http://mbpo.org/blog_details.asp?id=178&page=1





http://www.collectiveroots.org/node/761









Stringer, Scott. “Putting Food Policy on the City’s From Burner.” Huffington Post.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/scott-stringer/putting-food-policy-on-

th_b_233880.html. July 16, 2009, retrieved April 21, 2010

Wang, Youfa and May A. Beydoun. The Obesity Epidemic in the United States

Gender, Age, Socioeconomic, Racial/Ethnic, and Geographic Characteristics: A

Systematic Review and Meta-Regression Analysis. Epidemiologic Reviews. Vol. 29,

2007.

Whitford, David. “Can Farming Save Detroit?” CNNMoney.com.

http://money.cnn.com/fdcp?1271662956308. December 29, 2009. Retrieved April 20,

2010.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/scott-stringer/putting-food-policy-on-th_b_233880.html



http://money.cnn.com/fdcp?1271662956308





planning for healthy neighborhoods1

Documents