Healthy Behaviors and Choices (e.g. Fitness, Tobacco, Opioids, Nutrition)

Sharing Session - 60 Minutes

A16 - Building Public-private Partnerships to Scale Sodium Reduction Efforts in Food Service Operations Across Southern California

Presenter(s)

• 

  Brad Barnes, CMC

  Director
  The Culinary Institute of America Consulting

Facilitator(s)

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  Brenda Robles, PhD, MPH

  Chief Research Analyst, Nutrition and Health Programs
  Division of Chronic Disease and Injury Prevention

Co-Presenter(s)

• 

  Michelle Wood, MPP

  Program Manager, Food Policy and Procurement
  Los Angeles County Department of Public Health

Background: Since 2011, the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health (DPH) has sought to improve cardiovascular health by implementing sodium-related nutrition standards and healthy food procurement practices. DPH recently partnered with The Culinary Institute of America (CIA) to augment these efforts. This presentation focuses on how health departments can work together and collaborate with private sector partners such as CIA to engage food service operators to more effectively scale sodium-related efforts across diverse regions.
Methods: DPH has fostered public public-private partnerships for sodium reduction by collaborating with the County of San Diego Health and Human Services Agency (HHSA) to expand sodium reduction strategies and sub-contracting CIA Consulting to provide culinary technical assistance and business expertise in targeted food service institutions.
Results: DPH-HHSS has launched a streamlined, multi-phase partnership with CIA to better implement sodium reduction strategies in 2 hospitals, 1 university, and 1 congregate meal program. Phases include: 1) food service operational site assessments; 2) site assessment summary reports; 3) on-site support and technical assistance; and 4) a final CIA-led site visit. The action plan, evaluation findings, and evaluation framework used to collect data for this multi-phase CIA partnership will be discussed during the presentation.
Discussion: Public health departments and food service operators oftentimes do not speak the same ‘language.’ Lessons learned from this effort to break silos between public health departments and food service operators, through culinary and business technical assistance, offers an opportunity to inform healthy food procurement efforts across other local jurisdictions in the United States.