Bronx Health REACH and Others Call for Expansion of the Healthy Bodega Program
July 14, 2021
We were encouraged when in April, Bronx Health REACH, BronxWorks, the Bodega and Small Business Group joined Councilmember Vanessa L. Gibson calling for an expansion of the Healthy Bodega program. This call came on the heels of an understanding at the time that proposed legislation was being drafted that would create a license for bodega owners who attended trainings on best practices to become a H.E.R.O. bodega (healthy, educated, responsive, and operational).
We have subsequently learned that the proposed legislation has hit a roadblock and there is currently no sponsor nor continued drafting. Disappointed? We certainly are. Have we given up hope? Absolutely not. We will continue to work with the Bodega and Small Business Group, food advocates and our legislators to create a business environment that will support the selling of healthy foods in bodegas in the Bronx and across the city.
In 2015 Bronx Health REACH partnered with the Bodega Association of the United States (renamed the Bodega and Small Business Group) and its ally, the Hispanic Information and Telecommunications Network, Inc. (HITN) to launch its revamped Healthy Bodega Initiative which had been initially created more than a decade before to address the obesity epidemic plaguing the Bronx’s most vulnerable neighborhoods.
The revised Healthy Bodega Initiative provided bodega owners with the tools and information to make offering healthy food and drink options a successful business in the high need, low income Bronx communities. 56 partner bodegas participated in the initiative.