Meghan L. Weygant, MBA, Chief Operating Officer, Hudson Valley Care Coalition

In October, Eat Well Kingston welcomed Meghan L. Weygant, MBA, Chief Operating Officer, Hudson Valley Care Coalition to tell us about the Hudson Valley Social Care Network. The network can be a referral system for folks to access resources. Community-based organizations can be reimbursed for enrolling people who qualify for Medicaid.

About the Eat Well Focus Team

The purpose of the Eat Well Focus Team is to develop, implement and/or support policy, systems and environmental change by supporting and promoting local efforts to improve access to healthy foods throughout the community. We coordinate with gardening/urban agriculture efforts and organizations addressing food insecurity and healthy eating in Kingston.

Our partners include farmers, chefs, teachers, artists, nutrition educators, dietitians, parents, non-profit and for-profit organizations, communicators, systems changers, volunteer organizations, private businesses, health practitioners, nurses, doctors and most importantly: YOU.

Visit https://livewellkingston.org/focus-teams/eat-well/ for more information.

Issue 5: June 2025

Hello! Welcome to the fifth edition of Kingston’s Food Policy Bites! This edition will be a little unique. Typically the structure of each Food Policy Bites provides a narrative that asks a thought-provoking question through which to learn about a specific food policy topic, including a bit of history and technical details followed by application to Kingston, before answering the question with a Food Policy Takeaway.

However, with so much happening so quickly in the food policy world, this time we wanted to provide you with the tools, platforms, and other resources to understand all topics related to food policy in our ever-changing food system right now. We’ll summarize a few of the tools, applying some of their recent updates to topics that hit home in Kingston to keep that local connection you like. Scroll down to learn about the following resources:

• Civil Eats Food Policy Tracker
• Food Fix
• Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
• Healthy Food Policy Project
• Even More Policy Trackers & Resources

Find it here: https://civileats.com/food-policy-tracker/

About Civil Eats: Civil Eats is an independent, award-winning news site that covers the American food system, including topics of intersectionality of food and other significant social and political issues.

About the Food Policy Tracker: Launched in 2025, this tracker lets you search for posts related to actions taken by the president, federal agencies, and Congress that directly relate to or have significant implications for the food system. Tags include words and phrases like Nutrition, Farmers, Local Food, School Food, and more.

Civil Eats is one of the best news sources for food systems-related news. They post frequently, sometimes daily, about a wide variety of food topics.

So What About Kingston?

As a small city nestled in a rich agricultural region, many if not most of these stories can connect to life in Kingston. For example:

June 12, 2025- Senate Ag Committee Proposes Significant, but Smaller, Cuts to SNAP

This article summarizes the Senate Agriculture Committee’s proposed text for the federal budget reconciliation bill, which would impact Kingston starting October 1, 2025. The Senate’s plan cuts $209 million from SNAP. For a connection to home, one in 10 households use SNAP in Ulster County, and in some neighborhoods in Kingston that can go up to one in 4 (read this previous Food Policy Bite for more information on SNAP).

It also eliminates funding for SNAP-Ed. SNAP-Ed in Kingston funds free community and school nutrition education, and is one of the funding sources for the Creating Healthy Schools and Communities (CHSC) grant. For more information on SNAP-Ed, here is a link to a statewide impact report and here is the CHSC Year 3 Impact Report.

The Senate’s bill also increases spending on farm bill programs including commodity payments, crop insurance, and conservation programs, although strips the funding of its original designation for climate-smart practices.

Find it here: https://foodfix.co/

About Food Fix: Food Fix is a weekly newsletter from award-winning reporter Helena Bottemiller Evich, who previously led food and agriculture issues at POLITICO for nearly a decade. Helena both reports on food-related news happening in Washington DC, as well as provides contextual groundsetting, commentary, and analysis based upon her 16 years of experience in covering the topics. She works to make it both informative for professionals as well as approachable for consumers.

So What About Kingston?

The most recent newsletter shared was also about the Senate’s cuts to SNAP. This dives into where the cuts will be coming from, such as increasing work requirements, which studies have shown are not effective in increasing adults actually working as they do not address the underlying barriers to obtaining livable wage jobs, and shifting cost shares to states, and how that will impact tough decisions states will have to make regarding their budgets in the future. At the end, she provides her analysis of the situation, including some historical context that led to the situation, and what might happen going forward.

Another recent issue, MAHA commission report under fire over fake citations, reports on fake studies that were referenced in the Make America Healthy Again report that was recently released. This report is relevant to Kingston as it could have big implications on federal nutrition standards and priorities that govern things like school meals and food pantry nutrition programs; or not, considering the reduction in funding for programs that support nutrition education and access to nutritious foods. Again, Food Fix has a detailed analysis on that.

Find it here: https://www.cbpp.org/newsletter/signup/update

About Center on Budget and Policy Priorities: The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) is a “nonpartisan research and policy institute that advances federal and state policies to help build a nation where everyone — regardless of income, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender identity, ZIP code, immigration status, or disability status — has the resources they need to thrive and share in the nation’s prosperity.”

They cover numerous topics, some directly related to food, like food assistance, and some more tangentially but still importantly related, such as immigration and the economy. In addition to having a virtual newsletter, they also have a series called “Policy Basics” which gives a brief background on topics like the federal budget, taxes, and government assistance programs.

So What About Kingston?

CBPP differs from the others in that it reports on budgets and taxes overall, not just those exclusively related to food.

For example, their most recent newsletter covers the impact of the House-passed reconciliation bill on health care coverage for Americans. Millions of people would lose their health insurance coverage because of proposed cuts to Medicaid and changes to the Affordable Care Act, which means they would lose both preventative care as well as care for life-threatening conditions and chronic diseases.

Medicaid provides health care coverage for low-income children, families, seniors, and individuals with disabilities, including many here in Kingston.

Find it here: https://healthyfoodpolicyproject.org/

About Healthy Food Policy Project: Healthy Food Policy Project is a collaboration of the Center for Agriculture and Food Systems at Vermont Law School (CAFS), the Public Health Law Center (PHLC), and the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Health at the University of Connecticut, funded by the National Agricultural Library, Agricultural Research Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture.

It is not a real-time tracker of changing local, state, and federal policies. Instead, it is can be viewed more as a food policy resource and database. There are 605 coded laws catalogued in its Policy Database, along with food systems frameworks and case studies to help those who want to get food systems projects started, but aren’t interested in starting from scratch.

So What About Kingston?

The database has been a wealth of information in doing research for both these Food Policy Bites, as well as informing strategies and tactics highlighted in the upcoming Food Systems Plan.

A Note on the Food Systems Plan: After a strategic pause to reflect and make updates, followed by some unavoidable delays, the Food Systems Plan is back on track! It is currently with a graphic designer for a beautification pass that will also increase its inclusivity and intuitiveness through design. A public comment period to come later this year, exact timing TBA. Follow along at https://engagekingston.com/food-system-plan for more updates.

Even More Policy Trackers & Resources

Learning about and keeping up with food policy can be messy and confusing, but it’s critical for understanding the food system. It’s important to find a variety of trusted, reputable sources to help you hone in on the important facts and messaging while you drown out the noise.

If you have a favorite policy tracker not listed here, please let us know and we’ll add it to our list!

For more information on food & nutrition projects at the City of Kingston, reach out to Kristin Kessler, RDN, CDN, RYT at kkessler@kingston-ny.gov

If you want to receive future Food Policy Bites in your inbox, Sign Up Here.

An Eat Well Kingston Presentation

In June 2025, Eat Well Kingston welcomed Kathryn Brignac, Livestock & Natural Resources Educator at Cornell Cooperative Extension of Ulster County, who presented on what the 2022 Census of Agriculture tells us about Ulster County farms, emerging trends and opportunities​ in agriculture locally, current challenges farms are facing and how to eat farm fresh and support local farms.

Click here for Kathryn’s slides

About the Eat Well Focus Team

The purpose of the Eat Well Focus Team is to develop, implement and/or support policy, systems and environmental change by supporting and promoting local efforts to improve access to healthy foods throughout the community. We coordinate with gardening/urban agriculture efforts and organizations addressing food insecurity and healthy eating in Kingston.

Our partners include farmers, chefs, teachers, artists, nutrition educators, dietitians, parents, non-profit and for-profit organizations, communicators, systems changers, volunteer organizations, private businesses, health practitioners, nurses, doctors and most importantly: YOU.

Visit https://livewellkingston.org/focus-teams/eat-well/ for more information.

Issue 4: March 2025

Welcome to the fourth edition of Kingston’s Food Policy Bites! After a successful 3 month pilot in the last quarter of 2024, we’re back with quarterly editions in 2025.

The City of Kingston’s Department of Health and Wellness is tasked with facilitating policy, systems, and environmental change to benefit the people of Kingston. We know that effective policy is built on transparency and consensus — but also know that policy can be complicated and hard to read. To that end, we want to make the world of food policy more accessible and relevant to our city. That’s why we’ve created Kingston’s Food Policy Bites.

This month we’re asking the question “Does urban agriculture reduce food insecurity?” But first, we need to talk about what urban agriculture is and what it looks like in Kingston.

A Primer on Urban Agriculture

The USDA defines urban agriculture as “the cultivation, processing, and distribution of agricultural products (food or non-food) in urban and suburban areas.”

Urban agriculture has been around for a long time, since at least 3500 BCE when farmers of Mesopotamia set aside plots for farming in their cities. It continued to be found across the globe

throughout the passage of time, including in Persia, Machu Picchu, and the Aztec Civilization. More recent urban agriculture roots can be found in the “allotment gardens” of major European cities like London and Paris during the turn of the 20th century to help the “urban poor,” and in the Victory Gardens of the World Wars. However, the expansion of car culture along with racist zoning policies contributed to “supermarket redlining” during the mid-20th century and the reorganizing of cities, leading to a decline in urban agriculture.

Yet urban agriculture never really disappeared, experiencing the seeds of a renaissance during the 1970s as Black and Latinx urban communities reclaimed vacant lots by establishing community gardens to provide a space for community while feeding people. Detroit is a oft-cited case study of this, from Mayor Coleman Young’s “Farm a Lot” program in the 1970s that sought to transform 3000 empty lots into community gardens to the creation of Keep Growing Detroit in 2013 and the Detroit Black Community Food Sovereignty Network (DBCFSN) in 2018, the latter which ensured residents had access to food during the COVID 19 pandemic with a seed sharing and instructional video program.

Today you can find examples of urban agriculture all across the country, including nearby large farms like Brooklyn Grange, a rooftop farming and green rooftop business that operates 2 rooftop farms in New York City that span almost 5 acres and produce over 80,000 organically grown vegetables annually, to our very own Kingston YMCA Farm Project, a nonprofit educational farm located in the heart of Midtown.

As our world increasingly urbanizes, we can only anticipate a growth in urban agriculture. In our state alone there are over 1,000 registered or permitted community gardens in cities, according to New York State Department of Agriculture & Markets, so let’s talk about them!

Benefits of Urban Ag

Whether looking at backyard gardens, community gardens, or slightly larger scale farms for production, there are numerous benefits to urban agriculture that could be loosely grouped into themes like environmental impacts, health & wellness, local food economy, and community & culture (see below).

In a quantitative analysis on the social impacts of urban agriculture by CUNY, reported benefits from farmers and gardeners varied depending on the type of farm, which makes sense! A farm that primarily sells their products would rank the economic benefit as the highest just as a community garden might rank social connectedness as a top benefit.

One thing that was interesting was that general wellbeing and social impact benefits were more important than the explicitly nutritional benefits for almost all farms.

Urban Ag in Kingston

Urban agriculture isn’t new to Kingston. Below is a partial timeline of policies and programs over the past 25 years.

Capturing the state of urban agriculture in Kingston is challenging. According to the Grow Well Community Garden Map, there are 15 gardens, including:

• community gardens with private plots or shared labor models
• gardens that give away or sell food
• school gardens
• pollinator gardens (and more!)

There are also numerous organizations supporting urban agriculture in Kingston, such as the Kingston YMCA Farm Project, Kingston Land Trust, The Coop Concept, and more.

Kingston Planning Documents

Urban agriculture (UA) has been incorporated in a number of Kingston planning documents and policies in recent years, including the following.

PLANNING DOCUMENT: Kingston Urban Agriculture Planning & Zoning Study

YEAR: 2014

UA MENTIONS:

This was a targeted assessment of urban agriculture led by the Kingston Urban Agriculture Committee.

One of the goals of this study was to provide recommendations in coordination with the development of the Kingston 2025 Comprehensive Plan and advocate for more urban agriculture-friendly zoning changes, many of which were successful with the City’s updated form-based zoning code adopted in 2023. A Phase 2 was developed in 2017, but never finalized or adopted.

PLANNING DOCUMENT: Kingston 2025 Comprehensive Plan

YEAR: 2016

UA MENTIONS:

Goal 1: Promote a Sustainable Citywide Land Use Policy

Objective 1.3: Promote urban agriculture as a sustainable practice as a part of local and regional food systems change, with a focus on Midtown; – includes allowing agriculture in City parks

Goal 2: Promote maintenance and improvement of existing stable neighborhoods outside the “mixed-use cores;”

Objective 2.5: Promote social interaction through the provision of neighborhood gardens, community gardens, parks and other open spaces;

Goal 3: Preserve constrained lands as open space, agriculture or very low-density residential clustered development as appropriate

Goal 8: Promote a new planned commercial node in Midtown centered around

Education, the Arts, Entertainment and Ethnic Diversity;

Strategy 8.1.2: Acquire vacant lots and blighted properties for public spaces and urban agriculture.

PLANNING DOCUMENT: Kingston Open Space Plan

YEAR: 2019

UA MENTIONS:

“More than 800 acres of land in Kingston are classified as vacant, including 38 acres owned by the City of Kingston. While every effort should be made to promote investment in blighted properties, those properties that are beyond saving and that tend to be located in the most at-need areas of the city should be considered for incorporation into the network of community gardens.” (pg 50)

PLANNING DOCUMENT: Climate Smart Kingston Action Plan 2030

YEAR: 2021

UA MENTIONS:

Strategy Spotlight 20: Increase Local Participation in Community Gardens (pg 69)

PLANNING DOCUMENT: Kingston’s New Form-Based Zoning Code

YEAR: 2023

UA MENTIONS:

Urban agriculture is addressed in Kingston’s updated form-based zoning code under Section 405.21. This permits urban agriculture in nearly all neighborhoods of Kingston. Transect Districts T5-MS (Urban Center- Main Street) and T4-MS (Neighborhood- Main Street) require special permits.

Other specific zoning details are addressed, such as:

• Dimensional standards for structures must comply with the standards of the underlying district
• Urban agriculture shall not be a nuisance or hazard to surrounding neighborhood, and shall be maintained in healthy growing condition
• Rooftop locations are allowable
• Composting allowable, with size and location standards
• Accessory beekeeping allowed with standards and limitations
• Accessory chickens allowed with standards and limitations, such as enclosure and flock specifications

Does Urban Agriculture Reduce Food Insecurity?

So, now that we’ve laid a foundation of what urban agriculture is and what it looks like in Kingston, let’s get back to the question– Does urban agriculture reduce food insecurity?

The results are mixed. While an increase in food security is often touted as a benefit, there is not an extensive amount of evidence to validate this statement. A great place to start is UC Berkley’s systematic review on Does Urban Agriculture Improve Food Security?

What mostly arises in the research is that urban agriculture contributes to a modest increase in food security by providing access to fresh fruits and vegetables, which are typically more unaffordable food items. For example, a literature review from the Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future found that food insecure people could save between $240-720 per household per year from home or community gardens. This helps to fill a crucial gap in our food system!

However, at the scale that urban agriculture currently operates, there are mixed results on meeting all food needs. One study found that there is simply not enough land to grow food to meet all nutrient requirements, notably vitamins D and B12, which are more available in animal sources of food.

Additionally, as discussed in the Food Policy Bite on tax incentives to increase food retail locations, food access is defined in more ways than just physical access. Just because there is an increase in agriculture nearby does not always guarantee that the harvests will be available, physically, economically or socially, to people who are food insecure. A mapping of urban agriculture in Chicago found that many urban core, low-income census tracts lacked access to community or residential gardens. Another study found that the 68 urban gardens in Phoenix serve less than 9% of “food desert” residents, although there is the opportunity for gardens to theoretically serve more than 96% of the residents.

It could be argued instead that urban agriculture, at the scale it exists currently, can increase food sovereignty. According to the US Food Sovereignty Alliance, “food sovereignty is the right of peoples to healthy and culturally appropriate food produced through ecologically sound and sustainable methods, and their right to define their own food and agriculture systems.” Allowing and promoting urban agriculture gives people more power to define their own food system, even on a small scale.

How Can Cities Use Policy to Support Urban?

Yet, just because urban agriculture doesn’t have evidence of significantly improving food security does not mean it doesn’t have numerous benefits, including food access. Let’s take a look at other cities with a vibrant urban agriculture scene and the policies they’ve adopted to support that.

New York City & Boston

New York City and Boston both have urban agriculture departments (NYC Mayor’s Office of Urban Agriculture & GrowBoston: Office for Urban Agriculture) that work closely with food policy offices (NYC Mayor’s Office of Food Policy & Boston’s Office of Food Justice). NYC has a major focus on collecting and measuring data, including the NYC Urban Agriculture Explorer Hub. Boston is focusing on planning and policy, outlined in their 2024 Urban Agriculture Recommendations Report.

Salem, MA

There is plenty of urban agriculture work being done in small cities as well. Take Salem as a city more comparable in size to Kingston than NYC. Salem doesn’t have a separate urban agriculture department, but community agriculture was one of 4 main sections in its 2018 Community Food Assessment. This ultimately led to revisions to Salem’s urban agriculture ordinance and the creation of a municipal farm, Mack Park Farm, a transformed neglected ball field that grows healthy food for the community and is the site of Salem’s first community food forest.

Other Examples

Other examples of ways cities have used zoning and policy to define urban agriculture can be found at the Healthy Food Policy Project.

For example, Washington DC has a law that reduces property taxes by up to 90 percent for the portion of the property that is used as an urban farm.

Or Cleveland, Ohio, which adopted numerous policies, such as its Urban Garden Zoning District which reserves land for gardening and permits the sale of produce, along with its Summer Sprout Program, which offers seasonal access to water for community gardens.

So should cities adopt policies to encourage and support urban agriculture?

Yes! While the evidence is not there (yet) that urban agriculture significantly reduces food insecurity, there are many other benefits of urban agriculture.

Until our food system is able to address the tension between farm security and food security in our economic system, one way to view policies that support and incentivize urban farms might be as a public good for the numerous benefits listed above, rather than requiring that the urban farms operate as a for-profit venture where success is only measured by sales and revenue. This helps communities not to fall into the expectation of the “unattainable trifecta” of urban agriculture, a myth that (without significant, long-term investments) urban agriculture can 1) provide good food to all at affordable prices, 2) provide career opportunities for people typically excluded, AND 3) generate enough income.

A great next step for Kingston will be the its upcoming Food System Plan (to be released for public comment this spring), which will include some recommendations that build on Kingston’s already incredible urban agriculture foundation and our an award-winning, innovative zoning code. Kingston might take inspiration from other cities that have incorporated a food systems lens into their planning processes, prioritizing things like food hubs, required agriculture and/or food retail in development projects, mobile food distributions, and more. The American Planning Association’s Food System resources are a great place to start.

Regardless of the direction, it will be important for Kingston to continue to consider its unique community characteristics such as user needs, desired community impacts, and urban agriculture type to foster a healthy food systems with urban agriculture that is just right for Kingston.

For more information on food & nutrition projects at the City of Kingston, reach out to Kristin Kessler, RDN, CDN, RYT at kkessler@kingston-ny.gov

If you want to receive future Food Policy Bites in your inbox, Sign Up Here.

An Eat Well Kingston Presentation

About the Presentation

In February 2025 Eat Well welcomed Saoirse Moloney-Stevenson, Assistant Foodservice Director at Kingston City School District, who presented on the district’s trials, successes, and goals, along with Katie Sheehan-Lopez, Regional Farm to School Procurement Specialist at Cornell Cooperative Extension, who presented on Farm to School and the NYS 30% initiative.

Click here Saorise’s slides on KCSD Food Service

Click here for Katie’s slides on Regional Farm to School work

About the Eat Well Focus Team

The purpose of the Eat Well Focus Team is to develop, implement and/or support policy, systems and environmental change by supporting and promoting local efforts to improve access to healthy foods throughout the community. We coordinate with gardening/urban agriculture efforts and organizations addressing food insecurity and healthy eating in Kingston.

Our partners include farmers, chefs, teachers, artists, nutrition educators, dietitians, parents, non-profit and for-profit organizations, communicators, systems changers, volunteer organizations, private businesses, health practitioners, nurses, doctors and most importantly: YOU.

Visit https://livewellkingston.org/focus-teams/eat-well/ for more information.

Or contact Kristin Kessler at kkessler@kingston-ny.gov.

Issue 3: December 2024

Welcome to the third edition of Kingston’s Food Policy Bites!

A quick note to say that we’ve received positive feedback about this pilot, so we will be keeping it going forward in 2025! Food Policy Bites will be regularly released next year on a quarterly basis.

This month we’re taking a deeper dive into one of its components, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, otherwise known as SNAP. We’ll focus on providing a snapshot for how SNAP works, the benefits and barriers, and how it stacks up to charitable food as a way to address food insecurity.

A SNAP Overview

What is SNAP? SNAP is a food assistance program funded through the federal Farm Bill for Americans with a low income.

Who does SNAP help? SNAP supports over 41 million Americans annually, ⅔ of which are kids, seniors, or people living with disabilities.

How does SNAP work? SNAP provides cash payments via an electronic benefits (EBT) card to purchase eligible items at participating retailers. The amount is based on the lowest monthly cost of food, determined by the USDA’s Thrifty Food Plan, which was last updated in 2021 to allow families the flexibility to purchase more healthy foods.

Previous updates were made to the Thrifty Food Plan at the Secretary of Agriculture’s discretion. However, the 2018 Farm Bill mandated that the Thrifty Food Plan must now be re-evaluated every 5 years based upon current food prices, food composition data, consumption patterns, and dietary guidance.

How does someone qualify for SNAP? SNAP supports people who make a low income, are unemployed, receive welfare or other public assistance payments, are elderly, are disabled and low income, or are homeless. Eligibility is determined by each state.

In New York, the primary rule is income eligibility based upon family size, the federal poverty level, and whether the applicant is working, elderly, disabled, or has out of pocket dependent care costs. See example chart below from NY.Gov for income guidelines for households with earned income. More information can be found at https://www.ny.gov/services/apply-snap.

SNAP in Kingston/Ulster County

Who Receives SNAP in Kingston?

One in every ten residents of Ulster County relies on SNAP to feed their families. In urban areas like Kingston and Saugerties, even more people use SNAP. Using census data in some census tracts, over 26% of households are eligible for benefits. So how far does that go? In New York, the average monthly SNAP benefit per person is around $200.

That is less than $7 per day to feed oneself. To provide a little more context, according to Hunger Solutions New York the average monthly pre-pandemic SNAP benefit for a “household with a family” in New York was $384. Fast forward a few years, and the average cost of weekly groceries for a “household with kids” according to Census Bureau’s Household pulse survey is $331, for a monthly total of more than $1300.

Where Can SNAP Be Used in Kingston?

SNAP can only be used at participating locations that have been approved as an eligible retailer by the USDA. Approximately 14 food retail locations accept SNAP/WIC, which is less than 25% of the total food retail locations in Kingston and roughly 25% fewer than the average for cities of similar size. Furthermore, these locations are concentrated in Uptown and along Broadway in Midtown, with no outlets accepting SNAP and/or WIC in the Rondout. There are clear opportunities for improvement here!

However, becoming a participating location does have some requirements that may be considered barriers by smaller retailers. To be eligible, the store can qualify one of two ways through the stocking of staples foods: Vegetables/Fruits, Dairy, Meat/Poultry/Fish, and Breads/Cereals.

Criteria A: Staple Food Inventory Requirement

The store must have a minimum of 36 staple food items according to the following criteria.

Figure 1: SNAP Retailer Eligibility Criteria A Categories

Source: USDA Food & Nutrition Services For more information: https://www.fns.usda.gov/snap/retailer/eligible

Criteria B: Staple Food Sales Requirement

Staple foods must be more than half store’s total gross retail sales.

Figure 2: SNAP Retailer Eligibility Criteria B Categories

Source: USDA Food & Nutrition Services For more information: https://www.fns.usda.gov/snap/retailer/eligible

They must then apply online, and once approved purchase EBT equipment and services on their own. There are some exceptions, such as stores in an area with limited SNAP access to food. Additionally, New York State participates in the Restaurant Meals Program (RMP), which allows SNAP to be used at eligible restaurants. However, this program is in its pilot phase and is not available in Kingston or Ulster County yet.

A bright spot for Kingston is that SNAP can be used in multiple ways for local, farm fresh foods like farm stands (see KEFC Affordable Food Map for more details), CSA programs (register through CSA is a SNAP and receive 50% discount!), and the Kingston Farmers’ Market.

Spotlighting the last location, SNAP at the Kingston Farmers’ Market is an excellent way to also stretch fresh food dollars. Through the FreshConnect Fresh2You initiative, SNAP now has double the buying power with a dollar-for-dollar match up to $50 per day.

Benefits of SNAP

SNAP has economic benefits. Simply put, SNAP is effective. A 2010 report from the USDA Economic Research Service found that SNAP reduced the likelihood of being food insecure by about 30%, and the program lifted 2.88 million Americans out of poverty in 2019 (see Appendix 7 here). And its economic benefits are not limited to the SNAP recipient; SNAP also benefits whole communities along with the federal economy. Every $1 spent on SNAP generates $1.54 in economic activity. In some neighborhoods, SNAP payments make up half of a store’s revenue.

SNAP has health benefits. There is extensive evidence that demonstrates a strong correlation between food insecurity and chronic health conditions. Adults in households with very low food security are 40% more likely to be diagnosed with at least one chronic disease. By increasing food security, SNAP helps to increase health outcomes by enabling people to purchase healthier food, freeing up resources for other health needs, such as medical care or prescription medications. In fact, adults receiving SNAP incur about 25% less ($1400) in medical care costs annually than adults not receiving SNAP. The savings are even higher for those with hypertension and coronary heart disease, ~$2700 and $4100, respectively.

Another way that SNAP can improve health through improved food security is the possible reduction in stress. We now know that chronic stress can contribute to not only poor mental health and unhealthy coping habits, but also poor physical health through mechanisms like high levels of cortisol that impacts the body’s ability to effectively manage blood sugar levels. Over time this can lead to an increased risk of chronic conditions like high blood pressure, heart disease, and diabetes.

Check out this FRAC Report on The Impact of Poverty, Food Insecurity, and Poor Nutrition on Health and Well-Being for more information.

Barriers to SNAP

While the benefits of SNAP are clear, that doesn’t mean it always has the impact it’s looking for. There are are many barriers to SNAP participation and impact:

• Concerns about a lengthy, complicated application process. In Kingston, People’s Place has a Nutrition Outreach and Education Program (NOEP) coordinator who can help navigate this process.
• Immigration status concerns, for oneself and for family members. DACA recipients, Temporary Protected Status (TPS) holders, undocumented immigrants, and certain visa holders are currently excluded from SNAP. Equity Advocates’ SNAP4All has more information on this, and the Ulster Immigrant Defense Network provides extensive support to immigrants locally.
• Accessibility– both the cost of food and number of food retail stores that accept SNAP
• Shame, stigma, or otherwise reluctance to ask for help
• Logistical barriers, such as transportation or required documentation. Thankfully, SNAP applications can be submitted online and interviews can be done by a phone call!
• Administrative delays– Food and Nutrition Act of 2008 requires that states provide SNAP benefits to households within 30 days of filing a standard application. When measured in December 2022, over 46% of Ulster County applicants had been waiting more than 30 days for the return of their applications. To reduce these delays, the staff budget for the County department reviewing applications has been increased, and more people are being trained.

SNAP vs the Charitable Food System

The charitable food system, aka food pantries, community and soup kitchens, fill a much needed gap in our current food system. According to the most recent Ulster Corps Food Pantries and Meal Programs map, there are at least 13 open food access programs in Kingston and 43 locations in all of Ulster County. This is remarkable! Yet barriers remain to accessing these resources. Limited hours (only 2 local food pantries offer limited weekend hours and just 3 offer weekday hours after 5pm one day per week) makes it difficult for working adults to pick up food.

Alternatively, despite some of the barriers previously shared, SNAP still provides NINE TIMES more food than all of the 200 food banks through Feeding America. And while many free food programs are working hard to reduce stigma and shame, allowing people to procure food from stores where people are also purchasing without SNAP benefits may be considered more socially acceptable be some.

SNAP is both an incredibly complex program and a simple idea. It is also one of the most extensively researched, administered, and monitored social benefit programs that we have in the United States. And while the charitable food system does help to alleviate hunger, it has nowhere close to the scale of impact that SNAP does on food insecurity.

Additionally, SNAP is both incredibly effective and has room for improvement. While there are certainly opportunities on a state or federal level, there are also ways that cities can support food security by highlighting enrollment initiatives like People’s Place’s NOEP coordinator to reduce barriers to application along with connecting with food retail locations to understand and possibly help reduce barriers to SNAP participation, like the CalFresh Healthy Living Market Implementation Guide by the County of San Diego or technical assistance to independent grocery stores and co-ops provided by the Illinois Institute for Rural Affairs.

To be a part of this food access work in Kingston:

• Follow Live Well Kingston on Facebook and Instagram
• Sign up for future Food Policy Bites
• Reach out to kkessler@kingston-ny.gov to sign up for the Eat Well Kingston listserv and/or check out our Events page for upcoming meetings

Issue 2: November 2024

Welcome to the second edition of Kingston’s Food Policy Bites!

The City of Kingston’s Department of Health and Wellness is tasked with facilitating policy, systems, and environmental change to benefit the people of Kingston. We know that effective policy is built on transparency and consensus — but we also know that policy can be complicated and hard to read. To that end, we want to make the world of food policy more accessible and relevant to our City. That’s why we’re testing out a new initiative: Kingston’s Food Policy Bites.

After an inaugural edition on the Farm Bill, this month we’re pivoting to look at how one type of local legislation might impact food access.

Can Business Tax Breaks Improve Food Access?

Increasing food access through increasing, expanding, or modifying food retail locations is a hot topic. Between the Healthy Food Financing Initiative, a public-private partnership established by the 2014 Farm Bill and reauthorized in 2018, and the 90 policies that came up under a “food retail” inquiry on the Healthy Food Policy Project’s database, many policies and programs have been created in recent years to incentivize the opening of new stores or to encourage existing stores to offer a wider range of food staples and healthy items. But do they work to increase food access, and is this something we should consider in Kingston?

Let’s first take a look at food retail locations in Kingston.

Kingston Food Retail Landscape

According to the NYS Agriculture and Markets, there are 84 “food retail” locations in Kingston. However, using the SNAP store definitions and database, there are just 3 full service grocery stores (that also accept SNAP)- the Hannaford located in uptown Kingston (a “super store”) along with Kingston Meat Market and El Mercadito (“grocery stores”).

Given this lack of grocery stores within the city limits, 3 out of the 8 census tracts are considered “low income, low access” by the USDA Economic Research Services, which means that a significant number of households are more than 1 mile from a grocery store. These neighborhoods are largely concentrated in the Midtown, Ponckhockie, Rondout, and Wilbur neighborhoods (see Figure 1).

Figure 1: Low income, low access census tracts in Kingston

Source: USDA Economic Research Service, ESRI. For more information: https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/food-access-research-atlas/go-to-the-atlas/

Yet walking just a mile can be challenging for some. While Kingston has made and continues to make great strides in recent years to increase pedestrian and cyclist infrastructure, and UCAT bus service is free, there are still barriers to traveling more than 1 mile and back with groceries, such as:

• Physical ability to walk or bike, or the time to do so
• Sidewalk maintenance
• Bus routes and times
• Limited ability to carry bags and voluminous items, like fresh produce

For these reasons, the standard for “low income, low access” for households without a car is ½ mile. Using this data point, there are 5 out of 8 census tracts where a significant number of households do not have a vehicle and are more than ½ mile from the nearest supermarket in Kingston according to the USDA Economic Research Service (see Figure 2).

Figure 2: Low income, low access census tracts without access to a car in Kingston

Source: USDA Economic Research Service, ESRI. For more information: https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/food-access-research-atlas/go-to-the-atlas/

So Are Business Tax Breaks a Food Access Solution?

A quick glance might suggest that the simple solution is to open new grocery stores in these underserved areas. However, it’s complicated.

One major hurdle in most cities is that it’s illegal to open a grocery store in residentially-zoned districts. Fortunately for us, Kingston’s new Form-based zoning code made it possible for new businesses to open in many more areas throughout the city with the legalization of neighborhood businesses.

But this doesn’t guarantee businesses will open, even though they might be sorely needed by underserved communities. Opening a business is complicated, especially one with an industry profit margin of 1-3%, like a supermarket. There is also the phenomenon of “supermarket redlining,” a term used to describe major chain supermarkets’ disinclination to opening stores in lower-income neighborhoods, influenced by perceptions that these areas are at higher risk due to concerns about crime, social instability, and lack of profitability.

In response, some cities have developed “incentive policies” that are supposed to encourage new businesses to open. Let’s take a look at those.

Success Story? Prince George’s County, Maryland

Prince George’s County, Maryland implemented a policy that provides an 80% reduction in property taxes to any stores that sell fresh produce, meats, and dairy products in “healthy food priority areas.” (These are regions where people mostly make a lower income and also lack grocery store access). Since 2017, several new grocery stores have opened throughout the county, which is part of the Washington D.C. metroplex. This reduction remains in effect for up to 10 years for participating stores.

Not So Successful: Camden, New Jersey

Camden, New Jersey, codified a policy that takes advantage of New Jersey State’s $40 million in tax credits for opening & sustaining new grocery stores in priority areas. Camden’s policy also offers property tax exemptions to businesses operating in these priority areas (see § 753-32). This exemption covers all “improvements” to the property for 10 years. This means a business would pay taxes only on the lot, but not on the building itself – potentially a huge savings.

Unfortunately, a report published 6 years after this policy was codified found that not much had changed. No new grocery stores had opened in Camden. Worse– a corruption scandal hinted that the policy would have been abused to benefit select businesses.

Food Access: More Than Just Physical Barriers

Tax incentives look like easy-to-implement policies. But the verdict is out as to whether they actually succeed. While Prince George’s County’s policy led to the opening of new stores, it’s not clear that this actually improved food access for the community members it was intended for.

Why is that? Because physical access is only one type of food access. The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)’s Committee on World Food Security expanded upon the definition of access in their 2020 report “Food security and nutrition: building a global narrative towards 2030” to include physical as well as social and economic access as imperatives towards achieving food security.

Figure 3: Identifying the Six Dimensions of Food Security

Source: HLPE. 2020. Food security and nutrition: building a global narrative towards 2030. A report by the High Level Panel of Experts on Food Security and Nutrition of the Committee on World Food Security. Rome.

The high cost of quality food in America and the poor job market in these communities has much more influence on an American’s access to food than does distance to a grocery store. 

Indeed, a 2015 study found little association between tax credits and improved diet in a Bronx neighborhood where a new market actually opened. This seems to be true across the United States.

This situation leads us to one of the big themes in policy design: developing policy that targets and supports root causes, not symptoms.

Opening new grocery stores in underserved areas seems like a great idea, but if they do not offer social or economic access for the people living in those communities by stocking food that is both affordable and desired, then they are not increasing food access.

So while part of the solution may still be increased physical access to food retail locations, which tax incentives might help, ultimately the solution needs to be as nuanced and multi-faceted as the challenge. Want to be a part of the conversation in Kingston? Keep an eye out for updates on the Food System Plan and consider joining an Eat Well Kingston meeting.

Issue 1: September 2024

Welcome to the pilot edition of the Kingston Food Policy Bites!

The City of Kingston’s Department of Health and Wellness is tasked with facilitating policy, systems, and environmental change to benefit the people of Kingston. Some of this work is done through its Live Well Kingston Commission, including the Eat Well focus team. We know that effective policy is built on transparency and solidarity — but we also know that policy can be overly complicated and hard to read. To that end, we want to make the world of food policy more accessible and relevant to our City. That’s why we’re testing out a new initiative: Kingston’s Food Policy Bites. 

The U.S. Farm Bill

The Farm Bill is a behemoth in the U.S. food system, influencing everything from crop production to food access. Most of the Farm Bill’s budget is allocated to nutrition programs, but the policies and programs in its many chapters (called “Titles”) have dramatically altered the food system over its 90 year history. 

You may have already heard about the Farm Bill. It’s been in the news recently because it should have been reauthorized almost a year ago — the Bill must be updated every five years as part of its funding cycle, or else some of its programs expire — but this process has been held up in a divided Congress. 

Whether or not you know about it, the Farm Bill affects all of us, even if we’re not farmers. That’s because the Farm Bill covers three main domains that impact the type and quality of food we eat:

1. Food Access
2. Food Choice (protection for farmers), and
3. Food Impact (conservation of the environment)

A combine harvests a field of wheat, one of the crops most subsidized by the Farm Bill. Source: USDA

Food Access: How the Farm Bill feeds America

The Farm Bill puts close to 100 billion dollars in the economy each year. The majority of this goes into SNAP, formerly known as food stamps, but the Farm Bill also funds a number of programs to assist local farmer’s markets.  

SNAP supplements the cost of groceries for 41 million Americans each year, including 20 million children. In New York State, SNAP assists nearly 23% of families, including 851,000 children. Hunger Solutions NY calls SNAP “our nation’s largest and most effective anti-hunger program.” Indeed, SNAP delivers nine times more food to people in need than food banks and food charities. 

In this way, SNAP provides significant economic assistance to vulnerable communities. By supplementing food payments, SNAP

 has lifted 2.88 million people out of poverty (See appendix 7 here). In some neighborhoods, SNAP payments make up half of a store’s revenue. As an economic stimulant, SNAP adds $1.80 to the economy for every $1 spent on the program. 

The Farm Bill also gives lawmakers the opportunity to update food programs. To illustrate:

SNAP provides benefits based on the lowest monthly cost of food, determined by the USDA’s Thrifty Food Plan. The 2018 Farm Bill directed the USDA to update the Thrifty Food Plan to include a wider range of diets, including more healthy foods. As a result, SNAP benefits increased to allow families the flexibility to purchase more healthy foods & accommodate different diets. 

The 2014 Farm Bill began funding the Farmer’s Market Promotion Program, designed to increase local market access for “direct-to-consumer” sales. Poughkeepsie, NY was awarded almost $600,000 to expand their market through this program. 

In short, the Farm Bill helps determine how food gets on American’s plates. But through the bill’s targeted subsidies, it also helps determine what kinds of food end up in markets, like at the grocery store, big food distributors, school food service programs, and more. 

Food Choice: How the Farm Bill influence food production

Farming is a risky business. Farmers often go into debt each year to buy inputs for their farms, including seed, feed, machinery, and labor. And after a season’s hard work, there’s no guarantee the harvest will be successful: crops could fail, or markets could fetch poor prices. The Farm Bill was designed to protect farmers from these bad years. It provides monetary assistance to farms in two ways: through commodity payments to farmers and by subsidizing crop insurance. These programs can guarantee that some farmers make a certain amount of profit each year  — provided that farmers meet certain criteria. 

These eligibility criteria are where the Farm Bill affects the foods we eat in Kingston. Only a few kinds of crops and farms are able to access the Farm Bill’s 14 billion dollars in annual payments. These crops include several grains, legumes, and oilseed, but over half of all payments go to just four crops: corn, soybean, wheat, and rice. This is problematic for the food and health systems because of what happens next:

• It doesn’t matter how much consumers are willing to pay for these crops, because the government will guarantee a certain “reference price” regardless.
• Big companies are therefore incentivized to produce as much of these crops as possible. 
• This makes producing the “big four” crops very profitable.
• The market is flooded with these crops.
• They are present most often in highly processed forms, as corn syrup, soybean oil, and ingredients in high-calorie, low-nutrient packaged foods. High fructose corn syrup accounted for 8% of America’s calories in 2009.

This policy privileges just a few corporations over all other farmers in America. Less than 31% of small scale farms received commodity payments in 2021, compared to 75% of commercial farms. Among those who receive payments, payments are highly concentrated: just 10% of recipients are awarded 79% of all farm subsidies.

The abundance of these crops has downstream impacts on industry: the American meat industry has access to vast quantities of artificially inexpensive feed, hiding the true cost of meat production. Excess corn has also created a market for ethanol fuels and bio-based plastics, further entrenching the role of industrial agriculture in the American economy.

Food Impact: How the Farm Bill influences the environment

To borrow from Whitman, the Farm Bill contains multitudes. As much as the Farm Bill can promote highly industrialized agriculture, it can also work to improve the relationship between agriculture and the environment, inclusive of ecosystems like the rivers and forests as well as human health. Many agricultural practices that benefit nature also benefit human health, like reducing pesticides frequently linked with human illness. 

The Farm Bill has traditionally encouraged conservation in agricultural landscapes. Today it provides access to funds that allow farmers to make sustainable choices with their land, including funding EQIP, a resource conservation program that covers 75% of farmer’s new environmentally-friendly management practices.

Farm Bill funding also works towards making organic farming more viable. While the “organic” label doesn’t guarantee quality produce, organic agriculture uses safer pesticides. This has been linked with numerous health benefits for individuals and is proven to benefit the environment through improved soil health.

Link to the Farm, Food, and National Security Act

More reading on the Farm Bill:

– A brief, including a breakdown of Farm Bill spending

– An analysis of the 2024 bill by the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition 

– A 2024 Farm Bill wishlist from the Northeast Organic Farming Association of New York

– The four main conservation programs funded by the Bill

– A map showing the beneficiaries of Farm subsidies (hint: there are very few in Ulster County!)

Interested in further resources?

Sign up for future editions of the Food Policy Bites here. 

If you want to read more about food policy, this resource can connect you to several food policy organizations. Many of these publish op-eds about new policies!

*Special thanks to Brendan Walsh, graduate student at the Bard Center for Environmental Policy and food policy intern for the Department of Health and Wellness, in developing this project.*

Kingston Eats Passport!

We’re a big fan of delicious and nutritious food! So much so, that we launched a citywide veggie and fruit of the month campaign called Kingston Eats to joyfully celebrate at locations across the city. If you aren’t familiar with it, be sure to check that out here https://livewellkingston.org/kingston-eats/.

Things just got a little bit more exciting with the launch of the Kingston Eats Passport! All done through a QR code on your phone, there is no need to leave the country, but we do encourage an adventurous spirit in checking out one or more destinations right here in Kingston. By “checking in” not only will you be entered to win a monthly raffle drawing for a $50 visa gift card (might we recommend treating yourself and a friend to dinner at a local restaurant, or purchasing local food goodies?), but you can also get quick & easy recipes + receive facts and tips from a chef or one of the amazing YMCA Farm Project teens.

Participating Locations:

• Cornell Cooperative Extension of Ulster
• First Capital Poke Bar
• Joe Beez
• Kingston Bread & Bar
• Kingston Farmers Market
• Lola Pizza
• People’s Place
• Rewind Kingston
• Rosie General
• Rough Draft
• Salvation Army
• Stone Soup
• Sweet Maresa’s
• Tilda’s Kitchen
• Turn up the Beet
• YMCA Youth Farm Project

How to Participate?

1. Scan the QR code
2. Learn about the fruit and veggie of the month!
3. Don’t forget to click “Check In” to receive your digital stamp.
4. Check out other participating locations!

The 2024 Kingston Eats Passport will be going on September-December, so you don’t want to miss out!

An Eat Well Kingston Presentation

About the Presentation

In August 2024 Eat Well welcomed Brianna Merrill of the Hudson Valley AgriBusiness Development Corporation (HVADC). She presented on her work at HVADC, including FeedHV, a regional food rescue program that uses technology to link food donors of prepared but unserved food and fresh produce (including farms, restaurants, catering services, grocery stores, hospitals, universities, corporations and more) to nonprofit organizations with food assistance programs (such as food pantries, soup kitchens and shelters) through the efforts of a network of volunteers who transport, harvest and process donated food. Other programs shared were Hudson Valley Agribusiness Loan Fund, Hudson Valley Bounty, Farm & Food Funding Accelerator, HVADC as a Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI), and more.

About the Eat Well Focus Team

The purpose of the Eat Well Focus Team is to develop, implement and/or support policy, systems and environmental change by supporting and promoting local efforts to improve access to healthy foods throughout the community. We coordinate with gardening/urban agriculture efforts and organizations addressing food insecurity and healthy eating in Kingston.

Our partners include farmers, chefs, teachers, artists, nutrition educators, dietitians, parents, non-profit and for-profit organizations, communicators, systems changers, volunteer organizations, private businesses, health practitioners, nurses, doctors and most importantly: YOU.

Visit https://livewellkingston.org/focus-teams/eat-well/ for more information.

Or contact Kristin Kessler at kkessler@kingston-ny.gov.