The Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP) is due for reauthorization this year and it will be on the agenda for the fall session of this Congress. The Senate has announced that markup for the child nutrition reauthorization bill will take place September 17th. The CACFP is crucial to many child care programs which tend to be on very tight budget. The program has subsidizes the coast of meals in a child care

settings. This past week Senator Robert Casey (D-PA) introduced the Access to Healthy Food for Young Children Act. Advocates say it would expand and strengthen CACFP so more children have access to nutritious meals. The CACFP helps over three million children and 120,000 adults in receiving meals and snacks each day as part of the day care they receive.

In preparation for the fall discussion organizations and individuals are being urged to get active in promoting the Casey bill through three actions which include endorsements by organizations of the Access to Healthy Food for Young Children Act here. In addition individuals can encourage Senators to cosponsor the bill here and all can help create a buzz on social media by tweeting in support of this CACFP legislation through such sample tweats as Organizations, endorse this #CACFP bill to improve & expand access to CACFP! https://bit.ly/1MorCZt or Ask your Senators to co-sponsor this #CACFP bill to improve & expand access to the program. Add your voice today: https://bit.ly/1SC5oSm and by Thank you @SenBobCasey for introducing a #CACFP bill that will provide more children with the nutritious meals they need!

Some of the basic facts on the CACFP include that it assists over 3.4 million children daily in child care centers, family care homes, and after-school programs; over 118,000 persons in Adult Day Care; nearly 55,000 child care centers; and approximately 128,000 family child care providers working with 848 sponsors use CACFP to provide children with high quality nutrition and learning experiences