Harnessing Moments of Change

HARNESSINGmoments of change

by Eric L. Adams

As a native of the Brownsville neighborhood

and a product of New York City’s public school system, my passion throughout lifehas been to ensure Brooklyn’s bright future by helpingeach and every resident of our great boroughreach his or her full potential. For the past threedecades, I have served the residents of Brooklyn asborough president, police officer, state senator, and

coalition builder. Throughout my years of service to bettering our communities, I never expected to be on the journey that I am on today.

In 2016, while I was in my first term serving Brooklynites as their borough president, I was diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes after experiencing severe stomach pain, partial vision loss, and a loss of sensation

Photo by Erica Sherman/Brooklyn BP’s Office

HARNESSING MOMENTS OF CHANGE

in my hands and feet. After consulting several doctors and undertaking my own research, I started a new journey to better health by adopting a completely plant-based diet and losing 30 pounds in the process. One small step I took to leading a healthier lifestyle was to completely cut out processed foods from my diet. That included taking out processed meats, grains, and sugars. These products are destroying our bodies and are not providing us with any nutritional benefit. I also started cooking my meals from scratch. By going to a local market and picking up kale, onions, and other vegetables, I could eat five plant-based, nutritious meals a day to ensure my metabolism was working well. In that process, I constantly reminded myself that just like a former alcoholic goes to Alcoholics Anonymous meetings to get better and stay off his or her habit of drinking, the same is true for those of us who were addicted to unhealthy foods. It is a never-ending journey and constant reminder to kick the habit and eat nutritious meals.

While in the midst of this personal journey, I realized I needed to share the power of that moment with

everyone across Brooklyn. In my heart, I knew that God did not bury me with the weight of diabetes; he planted within me an opportunity to heal everyone across the borough. My experience shattered the myth that I had diabetes because of my DNA. It was not my DNA—it was my dinner, and breakfast, lunch and snacks. Through my own research, I discovered that more than 29 million Americans have diabetes, and one in four do not know they have it, with cardiovascular disease accounting for the most common cause of death among adults with this disease.

I wanted to shatter old myths by turning my own plant-based journey into a citywide campaign for better health outcomes. For instance, I implemented a policy mandating all events at Brooklyn Borough Hall have plant-based options by swapping out the high sugar, high calorie candy bars and sodas in the vending machines with different varieties of nuts, baked snacks and seltzer, as well as hosting quarterly plant-based/vegan meetups, which continue to bring together people from all walks of life to talk about important health and nutritional topics.

Adams believes hydroponic technology can vastly improve access to fresh vegetables and fruit.

VegWorld Magazine Issue 47 - July/August 2018 | 63

Photo by Photo Erica by Sherman/Brooklyn Erica Sherman/Brooklyn BP’s Office BP’s Office

HARNESSING MOMENTS OF CHANGE

These meetups, held quarterly at Brooklyn Borough Hall, are raising awareness of the power of a plantbased lifestyle in preventing illness and living a longer, healthier life.

To combat diabetes and so many other diet-related, preventable illnesses, it is important that we come together as one community because it takes a village to raise healthy individuals and families. We are all influenced by what others eat and the lifestyles they lead, particularly within our own families. The journey to healthy living cannot just end with one individual or another. It has to be a united effort combined with a deep cultural shift in the way we understand food and its power to transform one’s life and rid the body of preventable disease.

Combating diabetes and other preventable illnesses not only saves lives, it saves money. In 2012, diabetes

and its related complications accounted for $245 billion in total medical costs and lost work and wages. It makes good economic sense for our businesses to care for their employees’ health because it is their health too.

It is also important to harness this moment of change both at the individual and community level, because the power of the transformation that I and others have experienced through plant-based, healthy eating can be a game changer for public health outcomes citywide and across the country. For instance, my office is exploring ways to use our capital dollars to encourage schools to adopt healthier menus, as well as looking to work with various partners, such as the Coalition for Healthy School Food, to help us identify the most effective way to get healthy food in schools. One place to start is to

VegWorld Magazine Issue 47 - July/August 2018 | 64

Photo by Erica Sherman/Brooklyn BP’s Office Photo by Erica Sherman/Brooklyn BP’s Office

Diabetes was not my DNA— it was my dinner, and breakfast, lunch and snacks.

- Eric Adams, Brooklyn Borough President

Photo by Carol Seitz

Photo by Erica Sherman/Brooklyn BP’s Office

“We know that we would never give our children cigarettes to smoke, so there’s absolutely no reason why we should continue poisoning our children’s health with processed meats.”

ban processed meats, which are known to cause many types of cancer, from all school lunch menus across the five boroughs of the city. If we work together with government, non-profit organizations, and businesses, we can make it happen. Considering public school meals are funded by the New York City Department of Education and the taxpayer dollars it receives, we should be doing all that we can to use public funds for the procurement of healthy foods for our children. It is unacceptable that we continue to feed our children food items that are classified by the World Health Organization as Class 1 carcinogens on the same level as smoking cigarettes. I am proud that my office was instrumental in calling for and implementing “Meatless Mondays,” which introduced vegetarian-only breakfast and lunch on Mondays in 15 schools across Brooklyn during the 2017-2018 school year. This initiative is a great step in the right direction to teaching our children and their parents, particularly immigrant parents

for whom English is a second language, the importance of healthy eating as early in life as possible. We should also expand urban farming in Brooklyn to empower our residents to grow their own fruits, vegetables, and herbs at home or in school. This has the potential to create a farm-to-table pipeline where healthy foods are grown sustainably at the local level. In addition, I am proud that my office has encouraged workplaces across Brooklyn to adopt healthier menus in the workplace, just as we did at Brooklyn Borough Hall. By taking simple steps, such as serving fruits, vegetables and water instead of sugary drinks and donuts at meetings, employers, houses of worship and health institutions can take the lead on this issue and start the grassroots movement for better eating and healthier living.

As I look to the future, I envision a borough, a city and a country that have moved to a healthier future where our children are not suffering from childhood

VegWorld Magazine 66 Issue 47 - July/August 2018 |

HARNESSING MOMENTS OF CHANGE

asthma or obesity, or adults and seniors who are not struggling with cardiovascular disease or diabetes because of years of poor diets. We can take ownership of our bodies and foster a new generation

that is healthy and fulfilled, and not burdened by preventable illnesses. I hope others join me on this exciting journey as we work to change hearts and minds and seek a brighter future for everyone.

About the Author

For the past three decades, Eric L. Adams has served the residents of Brooklyn as borough president, state senator, police officer, and coalition builder. In November of 2017, he was reelected for a second term to represent all of Brooklyn as borough president. Born in Brownsville and educated in the City’s public school system, Eric is committed to ensuring Brooklyn’s bright future by helping each and every Brooklynite reach his or her full potential. Eric has worked to make the popularity of Brooklyn’s brand translate into prosperity for the over 2.6 million Brooklynites that call the borough home. He is a big believer in the power of connections, of bringing together people in need of services with resources that have long existed but have been underutilized. As a legislator, Eric’s record in the New York State Senate was one that underscored his strong commitment to the rights of those from every walk of life, including protecting the right to privacy, supporting marriage equality, defending a woman’s right to choose, as well as fighting for students’ rights, workers’ rights and animal rights. His work involved efforts to prevent racial profiling, gender discrimination, domestic violence and elder abuse.

Website: brooklyn-usa.org Facebook: www.facebook.com/BPEricAdams Twitter: https://twitter.com/BPEricAdams Instagram: www.instagram.com/bpericadams Youtube: www.youtube.com/channel/UCXNVvfjV6luPPRHsPhNXToQ Flickr: https://www.flickr.com/photos/137690381@N03/?

Photo by Erica Sherman/ Photo by

VegWorld Magazine Issue 47 - July/August 2018 | Brooklyn Erica 67Sherman/

Brooklyn BP’s BP’s Office Office