Director's Welcome
ALL IN has be very busy over the last several months, collaborating with a variety of partners to launch initiatives that actively address issues of poverty. Our March Steering Committee meeting will feature a status update on the one-year strategic plan we developed in 2019 and will preview our plans for a strategic planning process to prioritize our efforts over the next three years. We would love all partners to attend to help us best shape how we move forward in addressing issues of poverty in Alameda County.
Featured initiatives in this issue include an overview of policy and advocacy efforts to improve access to medically supportive foods, the launch of the Dig Deep Farms Food Hub in San Leandro, and the launch of the clinically integrated Food as Medicine model at the Tiburcio Vasquez Health Center in unincorporated Ashland/Cherryland. This issue will also feature an update on our efforts to engage transitional age homeless youth through support from Blue Shield of California.
I continue to meet with county agencies, community-based organizations, and community residents to identify opportunities to further our collective action for locally driven strategies. If we haven’t met yet, I would love to schedule time to meet with you in the coming weeks. Please feel free to email me at larissa.estes@acgov.org.
We know income inequality and the signs and symptoms of poverty did not happen overnight or happen as a result of a single sector. Addressing poverty will take time and commitment from all of us to turn the curve. Our community and economic vibrancy depends on it. As partners, it is imperative that we come together with our collective strengths and capacities. The Time Is Now!
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Food as Medicine Pilot Launches at Tiburcio Vasquez Health Center
Nearly one in five Alameda County residents struggle with food insecurity and the related poor health outcomes – both in terms of physical health and mental well-being. Managing a chronic disease – such as high blood pressure or diabetes – in addition to the stress of struggling to access healthy and affordable food has lasting negative outcomes, including delayed social development and poor attendance and performance at school or work. Through an exciting new partnership with Alameda Alliance for Health, ALL IN is expanding the Food as Medicine model throughout Alameda County.
With the assistance of a $275,000 investment from the Alameda Alliance for Health, we launched Food as Medicine’s first integrated Food Farmacy and Behavioral Pharmacy at Tiburcio Vasquez Health Center’s (TVHC) Ashland clinic in January. This innovative model will combine both food and behavioral health interventions in a holistic effort to address the poor health outcomes that result from food insecurity. ALL IN’s Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Steven Chen, lauds the partnership as “the beginning of what we know will advance health equity by transforming our systems of care and addressing structural determinants of poor health.”
At the TVHC clinic, patients will not only receive food prescriptions that they can fill on-site, but will also have access to the Behavioral Pharmacy’s group medical visits facilitated by Open Source Wellness and a TVHC healthcare clinician. The Behavioral Pharmacy will provide culturally relevant physical activity, healthy snacks, stress reduction, and social support programs to further better health outcomes. We are excited to continue our partnership with Dig Deep Farms – a project of Deputy Sheriffs’ Activity League & part of the Alameda County Sheriff's Office Community Capitals Policing initiative – to provide locally grown, pesticide-free, and nutrient dense produce at the on-site Food Farmacy.
We are excited to continue this work with the Alliance and look forward to expanding the integrative Food As Medicine model at a Native American Health Center clinic later this year.
Youth Action Board
We are excited to announce that Blue Shield of California has committed $200,000 to support the development of Alameda County’s Youth Action Board (YAB)!
The YAB – a committee comprised of youth with lived experience of housing insecurity and homelessness – provides our community’s most vulnerable youth with a space to be involved in the decision-making process as our County develops policies and services to support our youth experiencing homelessness. The funding from Blue Shield marks our first private partner to fund this innovative work and will support stipends for our youth participants. We look forward to building the YAB’s capacity and providing a space for our youth to advocate for, and take part in the decision-making process on, issues impacting youth homelessness in the County.
Dig Deep Farms Food Hub is Now Open!
 In January, ALL IN joined our partners at the Alameda County Deputy Sheriff’s Activities League, Dig Deep Farms, the Alameda County Sheriff’s Office, and the Alameda County Probation Department at the Grand Opening and Ribbon Cutting for the Dig Deep Farms Food Hub! Hundreds of community members, County agency staff, and community-based organizations joined us in Ashland to celebrate and tour this innovative facility.
The Food Hub offers unique opportunities to connect the many components of a food economy to one another. From farm to table – and every step in between – this pioneering community space offers a pathway to include justice and equity in every piece of Alameda County’s local food economy:
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Entrepreneurship & Job Creation: Traditional commercial kitchens are expensive and difficult to access, especially for entrepreneurs from low-income communities. The Food Hub will provide budding food businesses with access to a shared commercial kitchen space, which drastically reduces costs and allows the business an opportunity to thrive. In addition to access to the commercial kitchen, the Food Hub will provide entrepreneurs with educational tools on how to expand their businesses in a sustainable way.
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Urban Farming: Urban farming offers a unique opportunity to support local economies with job opportunities, fresh food production, and a closer connection to where food comes from. Dig Deep Farms will utilize the Food Hub to provide urban farming paid internships to youth and adults reentering society after being in jail. Coupled with supports and case management, this program provides a holistic reentry pathway for interns to develop valuable career and life skills to enter the food jobs sector and reduce the rates of recidivism.
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Food Recovery: In partnership with the Probation Department and ALL IN, the Food Hub employs formerly incarcerated people to divert more than 300,000 pounds of edible food from going to waste every year, repackage the food, and deliver it to food insecure residents at affordable housing locations throughout the county.
ALL IN Alameda County Sponsors
AB 3118 (Bonta)
On Friday, February 21st, Assemblymember Rob Bonta introduce AB 3118 – Medically supportive food and nutrition services. Healthy food in the form of medically supportive foods, a key component and low-cost part of health and wellbeing, is not currently considered reimbursable as part of California’s healthcare system. This bill will improve the health outcomes of low-income Californians by expanding the Medi-Cal food benefit to include medically supportive foods and nutrition services, also known as “Food as Medicine” programs. We thank Assemblymember Bonta for championing the expansion of Food as Medicine programs across the State, and are proud to sponsor this forward-looking legislation.
ALL IN is also a part of a Bay Area coalition led by SPUR advocating for the inclusion of medically-supportive food interventions in the State’s CalAIM In Lieu of Services (ILOS) proposal. Currently, the proposal only includes home-delivered meals immediately following discharge from a hospital or nursing home and medically-tailored meals (MTMs) as ILOS health plans can offer their Medi-Cal clients. We applaud the California Department of Health Care Services (DHCS) for recognizing home-delivered meals and MTMs as effective ways of helping individuals achieve their nutrition goals while helping them regain and maintain their health, but urge them to include additional food-based medical interventions and supports, including healthy food vouchers, food prescriptions, nutrition services, among others. Over 100 organizations signed onto the Position Paper our coalition submitted to DHCS advocating for the expansion of food-based medical supports included in the final CalAIM ILOS Proposal that will be submitted to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) in June 2020.
Partner Spotlight:
Hayward Promise Neighborhoods
 Hayward Promise Neighborhoods (HPN) is an innovative partnership between the community, the City of Hayward, Hayward Unified School District (HUSD), and nonprofit and Alameda County agencies working to ensure educational success and a safe, healthy, and thriving community for all Hayward residents. This collective, led by California State University East Bay (CSUEB), aims to break down the silos in order to interrupt generational poverty, create equity, and increase access to supports and services.
HPN’s signature program, the Hayward Promise Neighborhoods Promise Interns, offers participants with valuable career exploration and mentorship opportunities. For low-income students, the need for part-time jobs to cover tuition and other college-related costs is a barrier to accessing valuable career development opportunities, which are often unpaid internship or volunteer positions that only higher income students are able to take advantage of. These paid internships allow CSUEB students with a meaningful opportunity for career exploration, networking, and valuable work experience they can translate to post-graduation careers. Interns receive a competitive hourly wage to allow them time to focus on school and to be engaged in their communities, both on campus and at home.
Interns are HPN alumni who are currently attending CSUEB and are placed either at an HUSD focus school or another partner organization (e.g. City of Hayward, Tiburcio Vasquez Health Center), where they serve as tutors, mentors, and classroom or program assistants. Interns have the opportunity to work with current HPN students and serve as mentors to cultivate a college-going culture and connect the current students and families with wraparound services, including food resources, mental health resources, and information on college and career opportunities. In addition to the work experience gained from internships, the program supports interns with resume writing assistance, letters of recommendation for graduate school, and references for career opportunities.
Since the program’s inception in 2012, CSUEB Promise Interns have provided 46,115 hours of service in Hayward’s Promise communities and Promise Interns have a higher 4-year graduation rate (56%) from CSUEB than their counterparts with similar demographics (42%). Over the years, HPN has seen the number of high school students enrolling in CSUEB increase from 55 HUSD students to 341!
ALL IN is excited to have HPN as a partner and we look forward to your continued success!
Upcoming Events
Steering Committee Meetings
ALL IN Steering Committee meetings are held on the third Wednesday of the month from 1:00 PM-2:30 PM at 1221 Oak Street, Room 255, Oakland, CA (unless otherwise stated):
Neighborhood Steering Committee
The Fruitvale/San Antonio Neighborhood Steering committee meetings are held on the fourth Wednesday of the month from 12:30 PM-2:00 PM. For additional information, contact Hannah Moore.
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