BP WANTS CITY FOODSTAT

The discrepancies between food choices in the Upper East Side and its northern neighbor East Harlem are too large for Borough President Scott Stringer.
Stringer recently released a study of Manhattan neighborhoods that looked at obesity rates and the availability of healthy food. In light of the study, he has called on the Department of Health to create FoodStat for every city neighborhood.
Mirrored after a similar program in California, FoodStat would find the ratio between healthy food vendors and fast food restaurants or bodegas.
Stringer likened the program to CrimeStat, which allowed the police department to recognize high crime areas and target at-risk neighborhoods.
“Until we measure a problem in New York City, it doesn’t really exist in a way that city government can fix,” Stringer said in a statement. “If we start measuring and publicizing the FoodStat of every city neighborhood, we will see real change in the neighborhoods with the poorest food choices.”