City Council Memorandum
TO: HONORABLE MAYOR AND CITY COUNCIL DATE: AUGUST 6, 2024 FROM: OFFICE OF SUSTAINABILITY WARDS: ALL
COMMUNITY & ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
DEPARTMENT
SUBJECT: ADOPT A RESOLUTION SUPPORTING THE BLUE ZONES CERTIFICATION INITIATIVE WITHIN THE CITY OF RIVERSIDE AND APPROVE THE CITY SPONSORSHIP PORTION OF THE INITIATIVE IN THE AMOUNT OF $208,300 ISSUE:
Consideration of a Resolution of support for the Blue Zones Certification Initiative in the City of Riverside.
RECOMMENDATIONS:
That the City Council:
Adopt the attached Resolution supporting the Blue Zones Certification Initiative; and Approve the City sponsorship portion of the Blue Zones Certification Initiative in the amount of $208,300, or 1% of the total Blue Zones Certification program costs.
COUNCIL ACTIONS:
On June 21, 2022, the City Council approved a proposal by the Riverside University Health System to conduct an assessment to determine the City of Riverside’s eligibility in a Blue Zone Program. The assessment was at no cost to the City and fully funded by the Riverside University Health System.
On December 12, 2023, the City Council directed staff to draft a Resolution supporting the City of Riverside Blue Zone project and including a 1% sponsorship contribution.
BACKGROUND:
Blue Zones
The concept of blue zones grew out of the demographic work conducted by Gianni Pes and Michel Poulain, who identified regions of the world with the highest concentration of centenarians.
Blue Zones are communities identified as having populations living measurably longer, happier lives with lower rates of chronic diseases and a higher quality of life than the average. The Blue Zones Project began as a New York Times bestseller by National Geographic Fellow Dan Buettner and has evolved into a global movement that is now inspiring cities around the world to make changes so residents live, longer, healthier, and happier lives. Blue Zones Project seeks to improve the well-being of communities by applying best practices to make the healthy choice the easy choice through built environment, food, and tobacco policy change; environmental changes within worksites, schools, restaurants, grocery stores, and faith/civic organizations; and engagement activities that promote social support for healthy behaviors, volunteering, and purpose. The Project optimizes:
· The built environment: Improving roads and transportation options, parks, and public spaces · Municipal policies and ordinances: Promoting activity and discouraging junk food marketing and smoking · Restaurants, schools, grocery stores, faith-based organizations, and workplaces: Building healthier options into the places people spend most of their time · Social networks: Forming and nurturing social groups that support healthy habits · Habitat: Helping people design homes that nudge them into eating less and moving more Inner selves: Encouraging people to reduce stress, find their purpose, and give back to the community Readiness Measurement:
A Blue Zones assessment of the City of Riverside began in July 2022 and wrapped up in mid-2023. The City of Riverside was deemed a strong candidate for a Blue Zone certification process because the City met four key criteria:
Alignment of community’s current initiatives and strategic plans with Blue Zones Leadership support across sectors
Governing body support and continuity
Well-being improvement opportunities
Portions of the Blue Zones Assessment, Readiness and Feasibility Report are included herein and attached with the full report posted at the following link: Blue Zone Assessment Readiness and Feasibility Report.pdf (riversideca.gov). The Report evaluated well-being, policy, places and people through the lenses of assets and strengths, challenges and threads to overcome and opportunities.
In terms of the community health profile (see below), there are several challenges for the City of Riverside to lean into including poverty, adults with no health insurance, and prevalence of asthma, hypertension, high cholesterol, diabetes, obesity and sleep.
Fundraising
The Inland Empire Health Plan (IEHP) is sponsoring the Blue Zones Certification in the City of Riverside in the amount of $10,400,000 or 50% the program costs. More recently, a second sponsor (yet to be announced) has approved a 10% or $2,080,000 sponsorship. In addition, a third sponsor (yet to be announced) has also recently approved a 25% or $5,200,000 sponsorship. The total Blue Zones sponsorship to date is 86% when combined with the City of Riverside’s 1% sponsorship. Efforts are underway to identify the remaining sponsorships needed to complete the fundraising effort. In the meantime, Blue Zones has indicated that the program will launch immediately given the total amount fundraised to date.
Timeline
The Blue Zones Certification timeline is provided below. Based on current fundraising achievements, Blue Zones is launching the summer of 2024.
Chart. Blue Zones Timeline and Milestones
DISCUSSION:
Value and Measuring Impact: The “Placemat” (attached) further highlights disease prevalence challenges and the potential for changed outcomes. The potential value created for the City of Riverside is noted in terms of modified behaviors and disease. In doing so, the cumulative projected impact on medical cost savings, productivity savings and regional economic performance is estimated to $468 million in cumulative projected value.
Some of the key findings include pertaining to Policy, Places and People are provided below:
Policy
Blue Zones found that in terms of the built environment, the established downtown and neighborhoods, natural amenities and social gathering spaces and committed leadership were strengths. Several threats and challenges to the built environment were also noted including maintenance of new infrastructure and creation of new housing units. A more detailed analysis can be found on pages 60-99 of the attached Assessment including a policy menu for each category with action items, level of effort and applicable strategies.
Key assets of the Food Environment include a dynamic shared leadership to support the local food environment and existing and planned community food assets to support innovation in food culture and infrastructure, supportive local zoning, broad based commitment to local food and healthy eating and a mature hunger relief system. A more detailed review of the Food Environment can be found on pages 100-131 of the attached Assessment. An assessment of Alcohol (pgs. 133 - 149) and Tobacco (pgs. 151-153) are provided as well with a similar menu of policy options.
Places
Schools are a key component of a successful Blue Zones program. During focus group discussions, challenges were noted with respect to mental health (stress, anxiety, depression and loneliness), economic hardships and financial instabilities, as well as negative effects associated with social media consumption. Several opportunity areas were identified including implementation of a well-being metric and thoughtful evaluation of existing health policies and strategies.
Worksites represent half of our waking life and, as a result, are brought into the Blue Zones through voluntary pledges to support more employment movement, eating less junk food, making meaningful connections with coworkers, and helping people find purpose. Some opportunity areas involve leadership training opportunities to share the value of focusing on employee health, targeting some of the greatest areas for improvement including obesity, high cholesterol, smoking, and sleep.
Blue Zones would also focus on restaurants and grocery stores soliciting voluntary pledges around best practices like healthier offerings, more options for healthier dishes and portion sizes.
People
Civic organizations and faith-based organizations have a unique ability to connect and engage many residents from a wide range of backgrounds. Faith and civic leaders would be involved with designing the well-being plan for the community and for mobilizing support and amplifying the work. For these reasons, civic and faith-based organization involvement is critical to the success of a Blue Zones program.
Program Duration
The Blue Zones certification path takes place over a 5 year and 9-month period starting in 2024 and ending in 2029.
Program Cost
The program costs are divided into nine costs centers (see Chart below) with the local team comprising 44% of the total cost.
Chart. Resource Allocation
The chart below provides a break down the 11 full-time positions comprising the “local team”.
Chart. Local Hire Mix
Performance
Performance milestones are developed for each phase of the project. For example, during the “Transformation Period” (year 1), performance milestones typically include:
Kickoff event
School Summit
Worksite Summit
Engagement of people and organizations
Reach objectives set for worksites, public schools, grocery stores, restaurants Demonstrate policy movement
Documentation of success stories
Media engagement
Complete blueprint for Year 2
Should any of the performance guarantees not be met, 25% of Blue Zones’ margin is held in reserve and a credit is applied for future years. If at the end of the Blue Zones project, any performance guarantees are not met then the reserve/credit funds would be paid back to the sponsoring agency.
STRATEGIC PLAN ALIGNMENT:
The goals of the Blue Zone Project® align with Strategic Priority 2 – Community Well-Being and Goal 2.2: Strengthening neighborhood identities and improving community health and the physical environment through amenities and programs that foster an increased sense of community and enhanced feelings of pride and belonging citywide.
This item aligns with each of the Cross-Cutting Threads as follows:
1. Community Trust – Activities and actions of possible Blue Zone Project® benefit the City’s diverse populations and result in greater public good.
2. Equity – Blue Zone Project® tenants are applicable and support the City’s racial, ethnic, religious, sexual orientation, identity, geographic, and other attributes of diversity and are committed to advancing the fairness of treatment, recognition of rights, and equitable distribution of services to ensure every member of the community has equal access to share the benefits of community progress.
3. Fiscal Responsibility – The City of Riverside’s collaboration with the Riverside University Health System provides a prudent steward of public funds and ensures responsible management of the City’s financial resources while providing quality public services to all.
4. Innovation – Evaluation to determine the adaptation of the Blue Zone Program® is inventive and timely in meeting the community’s changing needs and preparing for the future through collaborative partnerships and adaptive processes.
5. Sustainability & Resiliency – Considerations of programs that build community wellbeing contributes to Riverside’s commitment to meet the needs of the present without compromising the needs of the future and ensure the City’s capacity to persevere, adapt and grow during good and difficult times alike.
FISCAL IMPACT:
The fiscal impact of this action is $208,300. Sufficient funds are budgeted and available in the Non-Departmental CM Sundry Account: 7211200-450247.
Prepared by: Brieanna Brown, Administrative Analyst
Approved by: Jennifer A. Lilley, Community & Economic Development Director Certified as to
availability of funds: Kristie Thomas, Finance Director/Assistant Chief Financial Officer Approved by: Rafael Guzman, Assistant City Manager/Chief Sustainability Officer Approved as to form: Phaedra A. Norton, City Attorney
Attachments:
Blue Zones Assessment, Readiness, and Feasibility Report Blue Zones Placemat
Blue Zones Certification Initiative Resolution ● Page 2