The RootDownLA FUNdraiser May 2nd, 2015

Are you as excited as we are about our Spring Fling? We are still in the planning stages and would love your help. Please fill out the contact form below with your super powers and we'll get back to you lickity split.  In the meantime save the date and come back here for updates!

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Rising Stars at RootDownLA

It’s a beautiful day when I wake up to an e-mail from the amazing board member, Corinna Gebert, who’s also running The Urban Food and Farming Training with Karen Ramirez - Sundays at our community partners, WeCan.  South LA students and our staff spend four hours of their weekend cultivating skills and friendships that will last a lifetime.  

Of course good food was involved!   Here’s a quote from the e-mail –

 “Yesterdays garden day with the volunteers was a success, we made some great progress in Bridgette’s garden, made signs and markers for our residential food garden Program, transplanted plugs and six-packs in the WECAN nursery, showed the visitors from Sonoma State all that RootDownLA is up to, had a fantastic lunch cooked by Andres and Kadeyjah and a great time overall!”

 A little earlier in the week, Andres Chopin planned and executed a BRILLIANT meal for the CD 9 Coalition meeting at Nuevo South tonight. 25 Non-profit Executive Directors were completely impressed with the chicken, meatballs, veggie platter, fruit, cucumbers, hummus and guacamole.

 The feast had no end.

THANK YOU!  Andres and Johnny, for pulling this off!

Our kids are making us so very proud!

Posted by Mrs. Cook

RootDown trains with Hunger Action LA

What’s the low-down on hunger and food assistance in Los Angeles?  Last week,a small RootDown LA crew, including Andres Chopin, Ana Torres (pictured above) and new Programs Manager, Shara Prophet, attended a Hunger Action LA training on food security issues in our communities. This training, held at the Community Health Councils building and co-hosted by Inner City Struggeles, was created to equip individuals with the tools they need to address their state senators and neighborhood council leaders at Hunger Action Day in Sacramento on May 17th.

We had the pleasure of meeting with some of LA's most enthusiastic and passionate community leaders including Frank Tamborello, community educator and Executive Director of Hunger Action LA.

We discussed the many issues surrounding food security such as child nutrition, fast food chains monopolizing our neighborhoods, food deserts, and the limited access to more healthy and nutritious foods.

The training also helped to dispel our various confusions about CalFresh.  Some of us thought only adults with dependents could get food assistance. Did you know,  CalFresh is available to anyone whose income falls within the eligible income bracket?  You can check to see if you are eligible for CalFresh benefits as well as sign up online at http://www.calfresh.ca.gov.

Though RootDown LA will not be able to make it to Hunger Action Day this year, we walked away from the training with a wealth of information about what's going on with food assistance and securities in our community.  Hunger Action LA, Community Health Councils and Inner City Struggles - we appreciate the invite and thanks for helping us help others to make healthy food more affordable for all!