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On Sunday, May 9, we celebrated Mothers' Day by bringing awareness to our community of who the hungry are in Washtenaw County, and what organizations are working to empower them.

Sarah Walsh Ross envisioned the event and co-coordinated it with John Erdevig, consultant with EET and organizer of the Good Food Garden at the UUAA church. Lucia Heinold worked on the committee, as well, supplying food, contacting panel members, etc.

John introduced the event by asking us to ponder:

How do limited household resources and food options push our Washtenaw County neighbors into unhealthy diets? Sometimes, paradoxically, uneconomical diets? What is being done locally to create systems that make healthy food available to people with limited income, transportation, or with physical limitations?

Sarah handed out a role-play, in which attendees were compelled to think about how to access healthy food with a reasonable expenditure of limited time and resources.

(far left) Mary Alice Helmic (UUAA) and Shirley Ramsey, both residents of Towne Centre in Ypsilanti, showed how they're promoting community gardening at this Ypsilanti senior and disabled high-rise. They discussed how accessible gardening is a benefit to physical and mental health.	(center) Jenna Bacolor (UUAA), of Washtenaw County Public Health, talks about their program, "Prescription for Health", where doctors gave tokens to the farmers markets, which brought people who may never have known about it to a place where they could get healthier foods.
Rachel Chadderdon (UUAA), Grad Student at the School of Nat. Resources, UM, showed us the Washtenaw Cty. Food Map that shows local feeding and food agencies.	(center) Missy Orge, Director of Outreach and Training discussed Food Gatherers and their initiatives to connect low-income community members with healthy foods. Shetalked abouttheir Gathering Farm, as well as their Community Kitchen.
Amanda Edwards, Executive Director of Growing Hope in Ypsilanti, discussed how they haveworked to have the Ypsilanti Farmers Mkt. be the 3rd in the state to accept food stamps. She talked about what Food Security means.	John Erdevig introduced the panel, talked a bit about the church's Good Food Garden, and summarized what we'd heard.