Category: Policy & Advocacy

April 29, 2024

The Blueprint and partners thank the Biden-Harris Administration for their recent announcement of 141 new bold commitments as part of the Call to Action for the White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health. As part of their National Strategy on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health, we hope the Administration will consider the unique needs of rural, frontier, and micro-communities, particularly their challenges to accessing federal funds.

April 16, 2024

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) recently announced its final rule revising the food package for the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC). It emphasizes more fruits, vegetables, and whole grains, as well as presents a wider choice of foods from different cultures, with implementation happening over the next two years.

April 4, 2024

Denver City Council recently passed an ordinance requiring Denver restaurants to offer water or milk as the default drink options on kids’ menus. the Blueprint’s State Policy Committee was one of the organizations that endorsed the Healthy Drinks in Kids’ Meals strategy, expressing support for the recommendation to ensure the automatic beverage on children’s menus is a healthy one.

April 2, 2024

During the 2024 session, state legislators have introduced more bills recently. The Colorado Blueprint to End Hunger’s State Policy Committee is actively involved in and tracking several of them. This includes the Healthy Food Incentives Fund, the Community Food Assistance Provider Grant Program, and legislation to address some of the funding challenges with Healthy School Meals for All.

The Colorado Blueprint to End Hunger’s State Policy Committee aims to create, execute, and manage an anti-hunger policy platform that advocates for sustainable, equitable, and effective food and farm systems in Colorado. See their state policy platform for 2024.

February 21, 2024

The Blueprint and members of its Connecting Food and Health project team of Workgroup 4: SNAP & WIC Enrollment advocated for the inclusion of food and nutrition supports as part of the Regional Accountable Entity Contracts for the Accountable Care Collaborative Phase III. The Colorado Department of Health Care Policy and Finance recently released the draft contracts, and we’re pleased that they included several of our collective recommendations. We’ll lead various opportunities to advocate that these supports remain a part of the final contracts and that Regional Accountable Entities are made more explicitly responsible for their members’ food and nutrition access.