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City Spotlight
VIRGINIA BEACH, VIRGINIA
Addressing Health Inequities Head-On to Promote Healthy Lifestyles for All
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ctive living and healthy eating are woven into the city of Virginia Beach’s unique
landscape. The city has thousands of acres of nationally recognized parks,
hundreds of miles of bikeways and trails and picturesque beaches. In fact, sixty-two
percent of Virginia Beach residents live within a ½ mile (or a 10-minute walk) of a
park. There are over 200 local farms throughout the city that grow and produce a
diverse array of fruits, vegetables and other goods and services.
The abundance of active living and healthy
eating opportunities and healthy city
designations can mask the fact that some
children and families in the city lack safe,
convenient access to these resources because of
where they live, learn, and grow.
For example, many children and families living
in the Seatack neighborhood of Virginia Beach
(census tract 442) live below the poverty level
and face barriers such as limited access to
healthy food options, transportation challenges
and low educational attainment levels, all of
which impact their ability to access healthpromoting resources and make healthy lifestyle
choices. Even the most motivated individuals
can have difficulty living a healthy lifestyle
when their environment doesn’t support it. As
a result, they are more likely to suffer poorer
health outcomes and tend to experience higher
rates of chronic diseases such as diabetes and
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Characteristics of the Seatack
neighborhood include
the following:
Twenty-five percent of residents live in poverty
(eight percent in the city of Virginia Beach).
The median household income is $47, 319
($65,219 in the city of Virginia Beach).
Eighty-six percent of children are eligible for
free or reduced-price lunch (thirty-six percent
of students in the Virginia Beach City Public
School System).
It is considered a food desert.
Life expectancy is 11.4 years less than
residents in the wealthiest census tract in
Virginia Beach.
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childhood obesity.
Taking Action
In 2010, Mayor William Sessoms joined the
National League of Cities’ Mayors’ Action
Challenge. As part of this challenge, Mayor
Sessoms established the Mayor’s Action
Challenge Committee for a Healthy Lifestyle
and Environment (MACC-HLE). This multisector, multi-disciplinary committee includes
city departments such as Public Health, Parks
and Recreation, and Agriculture. The committee
also includes community partners such as Old
Dominion University, Fresh Farm Supermarkets,
the Virginia Beach Restaurant Association
and Virginia Beach City Public Schools. The
MACC-HLE has worked tirelessly to identify
and coordinate efforts to promote health and
reduce childhood obesity.
According to Mayor Sessoms, “Virginia
Beach takes pride in efforts to create a healthy
environment for children through recreational
opportunities, strong agricultural presence and
commitment to healthy childhood development.”
five LMCTC goal areas through efforts such as:
•
Piloting Let’s Move VB!, a nutrition
education and physical fitness program
for youth in Virginia Beach elementary
schools’ out-of-school time programs.
Six of the eight pilot classes were offered
in neighborhoods with above average
poverty rates. When implemented in
all Virginia Beach out-of-school time
programs, this course has the potential
to reach over 3,500 youth annually.
•
Providing healthy eating and active
living training for early childcare
providers. Square One, a division of the
Virginia Business Coalition on Health,
developed a training called “Helping
Kids Get Fit!”. Over 80 preschool and
child care staff were trained in the first
year the training was offered.
•
Collaborating with a local elementary
school with the highest percentage of
children eligible for free or reducedprice lunch in the city to host the Plant
It! Grow It! Eat It! community garden
workshop. For youth service providers
in schools, day cares and faith-based
community programs.
•
Providing reduced rates for low-income
families to enable more people to access
opportunities for safe, convenient
physical activity at recreations centers.
•
Providing children in the 56 Virginia
Beach elementary schools’ out-ofschool time and four city recreation
center programs with 60 Skillastics©
Activity Kits. Over 250 Virginia Beach
Impact
As a result of the committee’s leadership,
Virginia Beach became involved in Let’s Move!
Cities Towns and Counties (LMCTC) in 2013.
LMCTC provided a framework for the MACCHLE to promote best practices, programs and
policies for healthy eating and active living in
schools, recreation centers and child care centers
throughout the city.
Through LMCTC, Virginia Beach has achieved
four gold medals and one bronze medal in the
Virginia Beach, Virginia | Addressing Health Inequities Head-On to Promote Healthy Lifestyles for All
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Department of Parks and Recreation
staff were trained in the implementation
of this innovative physical activity
plan, which focuses on core strength,
cardiovascular endurance and flexibility.
At the urging of Virginia Beach’s city manager,
the MACC-HLE embarked upon the Healthy
Eating Active Living (HEAL) Cities and
Towns Campaign, which assists local leaders
in the development and implementation of
policies designed to promote access to healthy
foods, active lifestyles, and workplace wellness.
City Council adopted a HEAL Resolution in
March 2015. A number of efforts are currently
underway to implement the resolution. For
example, the city council distributed a survey
to city staff in July 2015, and more than 1,800
employees responded. Currently, the MACCHLE is blending employee input with national
nutrition recommendations to develop a policy
for healthy vending options.
these disparities. VBPHD is engaging MACCHLE partners in conversations about local, state
and national disease trends; the distribution of
the social determinants of health across Virginia
Beach communities; and the effectiveness
of existing childhood obestity prevention
strategies. This process of reflection and analysis
has generated ideas for how VBPHD can
build upon existing collaborations to more
strategically and deliberately address health
disparities.
In many cases, there was not an explicit focus
on health disparities when the childhood obesity
prevention strategies listed above were originally
conceptualized and adopted. VBPHD believes
now is an opportune time to develop a process to
ensure that health and equity considerations are
factored into the design and implementation of
future health promotion strategies. VBPHD is
working with MACC-HLE stakeholders to:
•
Advancing an Intentional
Focus on Eliminating
Health Disparities
Use data to direct resources and target
interventions to communities
most in need;
•
Despite the MACC-HLE’s efforts to
encourage healthier lifestyles, obesityrelated health disparities continue to persist
and disproportionately affect low-income
communities and communities of color like the
Seatack neighborhood.
Ensure residents from communities
most impacted by health disparities are
engaged in the decision-making process
so that solutions reflect community
concerns and priorities; and
•
Collaborate with departments outside
of the health department to advance
strategies that address the social,
economic, and environmental factors
that impact health.
To better understand the cause of these
disparities, the Virginia Beach Public Health
Department (VBPHD) is spearheading efforts
to better understand the underlying causes of
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“An expectation of collaboration abounds in
Virginia Beach, and our strong network of
stakeholders is poised to elevate our approach to
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health improvement by adopting an equity lens
and tailoring approaches to identified needs,”
said Dr. Heidi A. Kulberg, director of the
Virginia Beach Department of Public Health.
“This process provided guidance in how to take
a more purposeful approach when acquiring and
analyzing data to inform policy and programs to
increase the chance of creating meaningful and
sustainable improvements for areas of the city
with the greatest health disparities.”
Neighborhood Services Coordinator
to provide community engagement
training to help the MACC-HLE
develop a plan to better engage residents
from low-income communiteis and
communiteis of color in creating
solutions.
Measuring the Health and Equity
Impact: The public health department
is planning to insert language into
the Virginia Beach Health District’s
Next Steps
Community Health Improvement Plan
(CHIP) that outlines specifically how
VBPHD is leading the charge to help
health is impacted by social determinants
stakeholders “connect the dots” and develop
and how each strategy
targeted, tailored
within the plan will
“By incorporating health equity considerations,
interventions with
impact health equity.
we can help our partners better understand the
an intentional focus
root causes of disparities, identify communities
on health equity. To
most affected by health disparities, engage
accomplish this goal,
residents
in the solution, and help all residents
the department is:
reach their full health potential,” said Dr.
• Leveraging Data
Heidi A. Kulberg.
to Seed Local
Action: VBPHD
is partnering with the city of Virginia
Contact Information
Beach’s Department of Communication
Dr. Heidi A. Kulberg, Director,
and Information Technology to develop
Virginia Beach Department of Public Health
maps that overlay health outcome data
Heidi.kulberg@vdh.virginia.gov
with various social determinants, such
as the distribution of farmers markets
across the city. The intent is to use this
visual approach to identify community
health needs and target resources and
allocate reesources to communities with
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the greatest disparities.
FOR YOUTH,
•
Prioritizing Community Engagement:
VBPHD is partnering with the Virginia
Beach Office of Volunteer Services
•
EDUCATION & FAMILIES
Copyright© 2016
Virginia Beach, Virginia | Addressing Health Inequities Head-On to Promote Healthy Lifestyles for All
1301 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW | Suite 550 | Washington, D.C. 20004 | www.nlc.org/iyef
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