Agenda - 09-07-1999 - 9c - Laserfiche WebLink

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5 Orange County Partnership for Young Children for Young Children Project Narrative Project Title: The Orange Courrty Community Health Awareness Project Target Population and Need: This initiative will strive to improve health awareness and health behaviors of Orange County families by promoting new and existing health education/promotion activities and events. There are two primary target populations, Orange County families with preschool-age.chiidren and the agencies that provide health and safety-related services. Strategies will be used to target low-income families and the "historically hard-to-reach" by collaborating with (at least) Hope for ICds, Orange County Preschool Interagency Council (OCPIC), and the Orange County Partnership for Young Children (OCPYC). For several years OCPYC's Child Health Review Committee has recognized that health promotion services are often more available to children who are attending registered or licensed childcare settings. Typically, young children of Spanish-speaking families do not have access to these services due to language barriers and family preferences for familial or informal caregivers. In addition, other young children who are at home with parents, relatives or unlicensed caregivers may have limited access to community.services and agencies that provide health screenings (vision, hearing, dentan immunizations, well-child care and developmental assessments. Attempts to provide screenings and parent education events to families outside of childcare settings have historically been poorly attended (perOCPYC's dentaVvisio~mmunization project reports): In the past, local service agencies have sent representatives to community events to provide health, safety and developmental information. These efforts (being available with agency brochures, magnets and/or simple trinkets) have had difficulty competing with more entertaining and "flashy" attractions. Historically, the most effective way to reach a targeted population has been to provide significant promotion and incentives (such as the winter coats provided by LINKS in the Northern Orange Health Fair in 1997). Representatives from local agencies have expressed a willingness to provide more frequent community-based screenings and initiatives. Although these health professionals are willing, there has been no one with the time or energy to organize and publicize such screening events. These are lost opportunities to the preschoolers and parents of this community. Project Description: This project will fill a critical link between the outreach and health promotion services available in Orange County and the population of families with young children who have not benefited from the center-based screenings offered in the past. There are a number of Ivcal interagency outreach and health promotion efforts, but their historical reliance upon voluntary agency representatives (with limited time and resources) has limited the effectiveness of these efforts in reaching their targeted populations. Local human service agenaes do not currently fund a public relations position to pertorm effective advertising, coordinating and promotional activities. This project will join forces with Hope for ICds, a volunteer force that has experience in canvassing targeted neighborhoods. in April of 1999, 70 local volunteers (1 bilingual person per team) reached 926 Orange County children with information about Health Choice, North Carolina's insurance initiative for young children. Coitaborative efforts like this will enable this project to bridge gaps between outreach services and "hard to reach" populations white building linkages to existing agencies. i3y funding the position of a Bilingual Community Awareness Coordinator, who will develop and spearhead an effective community health awareness and health education campaign, targeted to young families, an important bamer to access will be breached for families and existing outreach services will more effectively reach their targeted populations. The Community Awareness Project will utilize the services of a bilingual Health EducatioNPublic Rations professional to coordinate activities that mobilize existing community resources in an ongoing community awareness and education campaign. The Health EducatioNPublic Relations professional will coordinate participation by agencies providing services to families of preschool-age children at existing community events such as Apple Chill, Hog Day and La Fiesta Del Pueblo. Promotional strategies will be implemented to entice families to take advantage of the infommation and services offered by representatives of community agencies. Coordination efforts will continue after events to ensure that families are linked to appropriate service providers. Although the health and safety of young children encompass all the factors that impact their growth and development, this project's activities will focus upon promoting families' knowledge of and access to well-child