[00:00:07] Speaker A: Well, hello there. Welcome to another episode of just say somethings Weekly podcast. My name is Phil Clark, and I'm the CEO, executive director of just say something. And we're happy to have you with us today. Today, I'm very excited about having one of our partners with us, Sally Wills is here from live well Greenville. Sally, welcome.
[00:00:31] Speaker B: Thanks so much, Phil. I'm glad to be here.
[00:00:33] Speaker A: Well, so tell us and tell our community kind of the mission and vision of live well Greenville.
[00:00:42] Speaker B: Sure. Glad to do that. So, Livewell, Greenville is a community based coalition. We bring partners together, and what we're looking to do is to create equitable access to healthy foods and I physical activity opportunities throughout the community. And so we do that through setting policy or working with local officials and determining, like, how the environment is built and pushing and advocating for changes that make everything a little bit easier for folks here in Greenville county.
[00:01:09] Speaker A: Okay, so what would a.
Trying to see how to. How to say this. What would a. So if we look at food security.
[00:01:20] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:01:20] Speaker A: What is. Or what are you doing collectively for families here in Greenville?
[00:01:28] Speaker B: Well, how much time do we.
[00:01:31] Speaker A: The Cliff notes version.
[00:01:33] Speaker B: The Cliff notes version. So you bring up a great point. In Livewell, we actually are three coalitions within one. And so the Food Security coalition is one of our three. We also have a physical activity or active living coalition is truly the name. And then we have a coalition that's called the Health Equity Coalition. And while health equity is blended through everything that we do, there are some specific initiatives that we're doing that really are just not necessarily focused on healthy eating and active living, but really on health equity. Well, so if we go back to your food security question, we have partners kind of from every area of the county coming together. What we're looking at is the global system of what makes it hard for people to access food, first and foremost, and then, even more importantly, how we look at nutrition security. So it's one thing to have something to eat, but it's another level and probably a higher level to really look at the quality of the food that we have access to and how affordable it is, how accessible it is. And what are those barriers that are keeping folks from being able to access it. Now, that's certainly, we've joked through the past, like, we're not the cupcake police. We're not going around, you know, slapping that cookie out of anybody's hand. What we're trying to do is really look at that global system and say, where are their breaks? What makes it hard? So two of our initiatives that we have going on that are probably the easiest to understand if you're not in the food security world is first in working with Prisma Healthcare, which is one of the predominant pediatric health care providers in Greenville county, we started to hear through the COVID pandemic, but then still continuing past that families who would normally qualify for WIC, which is women, infant, and children's supplemental support for food, that the waiting time was more than five months for families to get a holy cow. And so if you think about that in the space of perhaps a woman didn't try to get certified while she was pregnant, although she was eligible. If you wait till the baby's born and then you're trying to access formula, formula is ridiculously expensive. And on top of that, if you're waiting five months, you're almost through the worst of the formula period. Right? And so what our pediatricians were seeing here locally is that families were having to make really difficult choices and sometimes watering down formula, sometimes extending feedings beyond what the baby needed. And then they were starting to see cases of failure to thrive. So they came to live well, Greenville, and asked if there was something that we could do to help support that broken part of the system. And what we were able to do is bring in partners who helped to support building a formula bank. And it's over at our lady's pantry over in Berea.
And families can get referred by their pediatrician, or they happen to be users of that pantry and know that that resource is there, and they can get supplemental formula to help carry them through so they don't have to make those difficult choices.
Another example that we looked at specifically around pediatric patients and certainly not everything that we do as pediatrics, but we know that children are often in doctors offices more often, so it's a better way to capture kids that are falling through the cracks.
We worked again with Prisma in looking at how we could move referral systems away from, like, you know, you indicate you're having a trouble getting healthy food for your family. And the old school model was, well, here's a pamphlet, or here's a piece of paper. Best of luck to you.
[00:05:20] Speaker A: That kills me.
[00:05:21] Speaker B: Yeah, it's awesome, right? Like, you're already in crisis, you're already having trouble, and then, like, here's a piece of paper, right?
So, um, don't get me started.
So we partnered with Mill Village Ministries, with Jolly foundation, with Prisma, obviously, and brought together these partners also Furman, I can't forget Furman. Or USC upstate. They're evaluating this project brought together some resources and helped to fund food security navigator at Prisma Health. So now when a family comes in, they're asked some screening questions. When they come in for anything, you know, come in for a well check visit, come in for a sick visit, they're asked these series of questions, you know, are you having trouble making your food budget last as long as you need it to last?
And if someone is indicating that they're experiencing food insecurity, they can get a referred to this navigator who is bilingual, bicultural, with Spanish and English, which is so important, and she has conversations with the families and really figures out what's going on and can refer them into programs like food share. With Mill Village, Liville was able to get a grant that helps support those food share boxes for up to a year. And so here's a great opportunity to get connected to fresh fruits and vegetables. You get them every two weeks for free. And so the hope is, over the course of that time, they're starting to enroll in things like WIC or SNAP, which is the supplemental nutrition assistance program, and get to a place where they're less food insecure. And so that's like, those are two great examples of the work that we're doing. But we're also helping to support things like backpack programs in schools. We're looking at connecting growers and farmers to vending options where food can be more affordable. We've been recently working with county council and their interest in looking at how we create access to more grocery stores out in District 25 in particular.
So every day is a little different, but we're doing a lot in that space.
[00:07:38] Speaker A: Yeah, sounds like it. That's great. And for those that don't have to go through those issues, it's kind of out of sight, out of mind.
[00:07:48] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:07:48] Speaker A: But we have so many residents in our community that are in that need.
[00:07:54] Speaker B: More than 11% of our community members are experiencing, at least are experiencing chronic food insecurity and even a higher rate. As we look at who's experiencing periodic.
[00:08:05] Speaker A: Food insecurity and in this day and time, with technology and with everything that we have access to, it's just, it's mind boggling that we would have that many in our community. Greenville's such a giving community that there's people out there with that kind of a need.
You mentioned earlier health equity. So to our listeners, what does health equity mean?
[00:08:32] Speaker B: Well, what we know when we look at, when we look deeply at data and live well, all of our work is grounded in data. We work very closely with Furman University, Clemson, USC, upstate USC, College of Charleston, Tufts University. Up in Boston. We have a great group of evaluators who come together and help to support our work.
And when you look deeply at data, it seems like common sense, but also, there are hard numbers to support. Not every person in Greenville county has the same health experiences, and some of that might be biological, but more often than not, it's social and related to chronic trauma, chronic discrimination, and racism that is experienced by many community members in this area and across the south and probably across the world.
So when we look at health equity, we're looking deeply at, like, what are some of the things that are creating these long term unfair results, health results. So some of the things that we're doing that are really easy to kind of wrap your brain around. We're advocating for language justice. We're starting in the space of Spanish because the majority of our non english speakers are spanish speakers. So even if we could just start there and work our way towards something better. So we're advocating with fellow nonprofits, like, really easy lifts. Like, hey, did you know you could tap into, you know, Google Translate, and you can have your website automatically translated to, you know, it's not perfect, right. But it's a great step in the right direction.
We bought equipment, and we're lending it and renting it out to fellow nonprofits and even some for profits to allow for live interpretation, simultaneous interpretation. As we're working with a group of local leaders called the Health Equity Action Board, the heel board, we conduct all those meetings bilingually between Spanish and English, and everyone gets interpreted to. And it's fully bilingual. It is so amazing to experience. And so we're working with other nonprofits, other service agencies, really, to expand their view of what can be done in that space. We're also working with partners like Greenville can and others to look at, like, what are some other accessibility issues? So, for people with disabilities, how can we open the door, especially with ablesc as a partner, looking at, you know, if someone has physical limitations, if they have visual or auditory limitations, are there things that we can do as nonprofits to open the door and make our services, our partner services, that much more accessible and open? Of course, we're not leading those efforts, but we're just helping to push them forward.
[00:11:33] Speaker A: Right, right. Well, it's all about, as I've mentioned before, the problems that our communities face are larger than any one organization.
[00:11:42] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:11:42] Speaker A: And we have to work together. That's why a dream of mine is that we have a true community center, where people. Families can go and everything they need is right there.
[00:11:57] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:11:57] Speaker A: What a.
It would just benefit our communities so much.
[00:12:02] Speaker B: I mean, especially if you think about transportation being one of the biggest barriers for families.
[00:12:07] Speaker A: Right.
[00:12:07] Speaker B: You know, if you only have to get to one place versus, you know, 510 in a week or.
[00:12:12] Speaker A: I'm sorry, I don't. We don't do that here. You need to. It's almost the equivalent of giving them a piece of paper.
[00:12:18] Speaker B: Right.
[00:12:19] Speaker A: You got to go across town. I just. I've been saying that for years and years. We need to have one center in Greenville that everybody supports, that everybody comes together. We get out of our silos, and we truly, truly work together collectively, and we provide that continuum of care for our families that we're all dealing with.
So, as we look at our. The different projects, I know recently, Livewell Greenville applied for some funding through the CDC.
[00:12:56] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:12:56] Speaker A: And fortunately for us, just say something is part of that and our Tobacco prevention work. Can you tell us about that project and what all that encompasses here in our community?
[00:13:10] Speaker B: Absolutely. So, the CDC, for anyone who is not familiar, is the center for Disease Control and Prevention, probably most famously known for its response to Covid these days, but has long been an advocate and a champion for community health. And one of their initiatives, their funding initiatives that they've had for years is called the racial and ethnic approaches to community health, or the reach grant. And the focus of that grant has always been looking at different systems and policy changes that work, have worked in other communities and looking at expansion with the. Really with the idea that we are helping to reduce health inequities. It's up to each community to define which population groups they're working with. In Greenville county, we really looked at the data and saw that african american and hispanic community members were probably at greatest risk for health disparities here. So those are the two populations of interest. And then within the grant, there are four components.
There's addressing health or food security, which we've already talked about. There's addressing access to physical activity and active living opportunities, and our active living coalition is leading that work.
There is obviously a tobacco prevention component, and it was a natural connection. We have worked together on other grants to work with just say something to lead those efforts. And then there's a fourth component that's looking at adult vaccinations, particularly flu and COVID vaccinations, when we looked at where community members were least likely to engage in vaccines for adults, and it's really adult driven, not children driven, those two rose to the surface. It just made the most sense to do that. And so some partners, like Unity Health on Maine, urban league of the upstate ream, Greenville Hispanic alliance, bonds of corps St. Francis, are leading those efforts in the vaccine space.
[00:15:15] Speaker A: Okay. And so that project is five years.
[00:15:20] Speaker B: It is.
[00:15:21] Speaker A: And so our goal is hopefully that at the end of those five years, that we will have a stronger, healthier community for everybody.
As we take this to a close, is there one thing, excuse me, is there one thing that you would like for our listeners to know about Livewell?
[00:15:50] Speaker B: I think the biggest thing to know about Livewell is really the understanding that we work in the background. Like we're not the upfront folks there might, you know, for some of your listeners, they've probably never heard of us. And that's okay, because so much of what we do is bringing those folks who are already working in the space together. It's that whole model. Like, we don't make the things you use every day. We make them better. That's how live well likes to operate. It's certainly not that we don't take credit, it's not that we don't lead initiatives, but our best work is done through that collective impact. And so as we bring partners to work more in concert with one another, it's a better use of, of local, federal philanthropic dollars.
But it also helps us get to that big systems piece, because if any of the problems that any of our organizations are facing, if they were simple, they'd already be solved. So these are big, complex social issues that are going to take big, complex social problems or social solutions to make a difference, and they're going to be generational solutions. And so with that in mind, just like, just say something, wakes up every morning like, what are we going to do to move the needle a little bit further? That's what we're doing behind the scenes. What are we doing to move the needle a little bit further towards healthy, for access to healthy foods, access to physical activity opportunities and active living? And again, looking at how health equity blends through all of that.
[00:17:17] Speaker A: So you are the convener.
[00:17:19] Speaker B: We are the convener.
[00:17:20] Speaker A: And I know we've talked about some things before, and we'll continue to have these conversations.
How can people check out what you're doing? How can they get in touch with you all?
[00:17:34] Speaker B: I mean, the best thing to do is start at our website. We have some fantastic resources and great information there. So just www.livewellgreenville.org. everything's spelled out and then following us on social media, where you on all the regular platforms and really help to keep up with the initiatives that are going on. And then the other best thing that any listener can do is as you're hearing about the things that Livewell might be doing or that our partners are doing and thinking about what is my role that I could potentially play in all of that. Sometimes the answer is, there is no role. Stay out of the way. But a lot of times there's like, oh, I didn't realize that there were folks that we're coming together to work on language justice. We're serving a lot of hispanic community members. What can we do to help make it easier to serve? And so some of that's just opening eyes. Some of it's showing someone how easy it is to step through the door. And sometimes it is building a door when there wasn't one. And so much of our work is kind of all of that happening behind the scenes.
[00:18:38] Speaker A: That's great. That's great. Well, Sally, I appreciate you being with us today. Hopefully our listeners have learned something that they didn't know. Check out their website. And this is Phil Clark with just say something. You can always reach
[email protected]. or give us that old fashioned phone call, 864-467-4099 so until next week, I hope you have a great one and look forward to seeing you soon. Thank you.
