The Mayor’s Healthy Hometown Movement is a community-wide effort designed to create a new culture in Louisville where physical activity and optimal nutrition are the norm. The Mayor’s Movement seeks to motivate Louisville Metro citizens to increase their level of physical activity and to adopt healthier lifestyles.

The Movement is an integrated umbrella-style program, designed to raise awareness and encourage Louisvillians to give up unhealthy habits and substitute simple, healthy behaviors, over time, by providing important information, creating partnerships and highlighting resources available to all citizens of Louisville.

The first phase of The Mayor’s Healthy Hometown Movement – Move It, Louisville! -- focuses on the benefits of physical activity and will provide important information and examples for how to make physical activity an integral part of the daily life. Subsequent phases will focus on the issues of nutrition and disease prevention.

Currently, 59.6% of Louisvillians are overweight; of those, 28.6% are obese. More than 78% are not eating five or more servings of fruits and vegetables per day and 35% engage in no leisure time physical activity. Two hundred eighty-nine out of every 100,000 Louisvillians will die of heart disease, compared to 247 nationwide and 61 out of every 100,000 Louisvillians will die of stroke, compared to 58 nationwide. Nine percent of Louisvillians have been diagnosed with diabetes as compared to 6% nationwide.

The Mayor’s Healthy Hometown Movement seeks to contribute to the Mayor’s goals by:

• Increasing the number of people in Louisville Metro who engage in 30 minutes of moderate physical activity at least 5 days a week.
  
• Decreasing the percentage of overweight or obese people in Louisville Metro.
  
• Increasing the number of people in Louisville Metro who eat five or more servings of fruits and vegetables per day.

• Developing a strong baseline of worksite wellness programs and activities in the community.

• Improving health equity by supporting physical activity programs in communities most adversely impacted by poor health. 
  

The Movement, as developed and implemented though the Louisville Metro Department of Public Health and Wellness, and given oversight by a representative 150-member Advisory Committee, is an important strategic community opportunity with very real and measurable residual community benefit.

Initially, the MHHM targeted city employees, private sector employers and public/private partnerships with the goal of providing excellent examples and model programs for neighborhood organizations, schools, worksites and individuals. 

Information contact: Susan McNeese Lynch, 502-836-5347, smlcomm@aol.com.

Stats Sources: 2002 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance Survey; Centers for Disease Control & Prevention