DATE: October 11, 2022
TO: Mayor and City Council
FROM: Assistant City Manager
SUBJECT Adopt a Resolution Authorizing the City Manager to Accept and Appropriate $125,000 in Grant Funding from the Stupski Foundation for the Hayward Food, Agriculture, and Economy Plan
RECOMMENDATION
That Council adopts a resolution (Attachment II) authorizing the City Manager to accept and appropriate $125,000 to Fund 240 in grant funding from the Stupski Foundation for the Hayward Food, Agriculture, and Economy Plan.
SUMMARY
On October 19, 2021, Council adopted a resolution to join Alameda County’s ALL IN Eats partnership. As part of this work, staff applied for and received a $125,000 planning grant from the Stupski Foundation to build capacity alongside key community partners and develop a Food, Agriculture, and Economy Action Plan. Staff is seeking Council authorization to accept this grant funding.
BACKGROUND
At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, the City partnered with several organizations to tackle the significant demand for food in Hayward. The City partnered with Chabot Community College to launch and staff a food distribution site that distributed over 1,701,432 pounds of food to 179,700 people. Throughout these efforts, community and educational partners expressed the need for a more coherent community-led plan around food access and the need for capacity building. Despite this desire for collective planning, Hayward does not have an obvious community-based organization with the capacity or mission to lead this effort.
On October 19, 2021, Council adopted a resolution to join Alameda County’s ALL IN Eats partnership. The purpose of ALL IN is to provide leadership, innovation, and collaboration across public, private, and community sectors to address the root causes of poverty. Since joining, staff from the City Manager’s Office has been attending the monthly steering committee and working group meetings.
At the January 29, 2022 Strategic Roadmap Planning session, Council ranked their top priority projects, and ranked the project to “exploring funding opportunities to increase the circular food economy in Hayward” as one of the highest priority items.
As a response to Council’s interests and feedback from community partners, staff sought funding to organize a collective effort and engage partners to create a Food, Agriculture, and Economy Plan for Hayward. Staff applied for and received a $125,000 grant from the Stupski Foundation. There is no match requirement for the funding and no strict requirement for when this funding should be spent.
DISCUSSION
Staff proposes using the grant funds to engage partners and residents to identify immediate and long-term priorities through community-led interviews and surveying, paid internships to support evidence gathering and planning efforts, and site visits to successful circular food economy examples.
Work group meetings with partners would be based on the three topics: Food Access & Security, Career Pathways & Entrepreneurship, and Culture & Heritage. These meeting would begin in October and run through the beginning of 2023. The committee and work groups would identify key priorities by the end of May 2022 to be shared with future funders.
Action Plan Partners - Throughout the month of August, staff met with over 20 organizations and service providers to gauge the need and interest to participate in a Food Action Plan for Hayward.
Partners that have expressed interest in this effort include: Cal State East Bay, Chabot College, Deputy Sheriffs' Activities League (Dig Deep Farms), Downtown Streets Team, Eden Area Food Alliance, Eden ROP, Eden United Church of Christ, First Pres/South Hayward Parish, ForestR.org, Glad Tidings, Hayward Area Recreation and Park District, Hayward Community Gardeners, Hayward Library Staff, Hayward Environmental Services staff, Hayward Promise Neighborhoods (HPN), Hayward Unified School District/Tennyson High School, Humanity for 100K Trees, StopWaste, Tiburcio Vasquez Health Center, UC Agriculture Extension and Nutrition staff.
Alameda County Community Food Bank and Berkley Food Network are additional organizations that staff has met with that have expressed tentative interest in providing technical assistance.
FISCAL IMPACT
The funding for this grant is solely for the purpose of planning and capacity building. It is a one-time grant with no match requirement and will have no impact on the City’s funds.
STRATEGIC ROADMAP
This agenda item is a project in the City’s Strategic Roadmap. It is related to the following project:
Confront Climate Crisis & Champion Environmental Justice: Explore funding opportunities to increase the circular food economy in Hayward as part of the Alameda County All in Eats Initiative
NEXT STEPS
If Council approves the resolution, staff will use the funding to continue work on the Food, Economy, and Agriculture Action Plan. Staff will return to Council for a work session on October 25, 2022 to present preliminary data on food access and career pathways in Hayward and seek Council feedback on the scope of the Action Plan.
Prepared by: Emily Hwang, Management Fellow
Mary Thomas, Management Analyst
Recommended by: Jennifer Ott, Assistant City Manager
Approved by:
_________________________________
Kelly McAdoo, City Manager
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