CHARLENE'S TUMBLR

The Kresge Foundation in Troy, Michigan, has announced a two-year initiative designed to raise public awareness of the environmental health hazards posed by lead while advancing community efforts to eliminate childhood lead poisoning. As part of its Getting-the-Lead-Out initiative, Kresge will engage with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and its Lead Poisoning Prevention Program to explore how the foundation’s grants can best be integrated with the Healthy People 2010 project, which is working to put an end to elevated lead levels in the blood of at-risk children by 2010. In December, Kresge announced grants totaling $4 million to six nonprofit and municipal organizations engaged in lead testing, abatement, advocacy, and data collection in Detroit, Newark, and Oakland. CLEARCorps/Detroit, a community-based, childhood lead-poisoning prevention program, was awarded a two-year, $600,000 grant, while Newark’s Department of Family and Child Well-Being will receive $1.5 million over two years to help reduce the incidence of childhood lead poisoning among low-income families with children under age six. “Kresge is making an investment in health programming that directly impacts the lives of children and families,” said Phyllis D. Meadows, senior fellow on Kresge’s Health Program team. “Through its grantmaking, the foundation hopes to leverage the positive work being done on childhood lead poisoning and to take it to the next level.” For more information about the grants, visit the Kresge Foundation Web site. “Getting-the-Lead-Out Initiative Will Help Cities Eliminate Childhood Lead Poisoning.” Kresge Foundation Press Release 3/26/09.