African Heritage Food Co-op rooted in city's healthy food initiative

Much of a plan developed by a mayoral task force focused on increasing healthy food access in the City of Niagara Falls requires others to take it up its recommendations. 

Alexander Wright, the founder of the African Heritage Food Co-op, already had plans in motion before Thursday's public debut. 

The strategy, developed with multiple stakeholders Mayor Paul Dyster's Healthy Food, Healthy People Task Force, was presented to lawmakers earlier this month and to the broader public on Thursday at the co-op's headquarters, 2616 Highland Ave. 

Outside of grocery stores like the co-op, the plan, which is available online, suggests a variety of practices that can be used to alleviate the lack of availability and issues of access surrounding fresh food options, including the proliferation of farmers markets, public education and infrastructure investment.

Wright, a native of the City of Buffalo's east side who had family in the Falls, said the lack of healthy food options in African-American communities was one of many reasons that led him to establish the initiative he has now brought to the city's North End. 

"When you see something is wrong you have two choices," he said. "You can complain about it – you can go on Facebook, social media – or you can change it." 

Wright said real change is not accomplished individually, but through participation in groups. Through networking, the co-op grew from an idea, to a delivery service and now to a brick-and-mortar storefront slated to open Feb. 23. 

Felicia Johnson, a senior project manager with the Community Health Center of Niagara, watched the co-op's transformation take place and was instrumental to connecting Wright with local partners, he said. The project was also assisted by $166,000 in federal funding obtained through the city's Department of Community Development. 

The department's director, Seth Piccirillo, said the money will help transform the space officials stood in Thursday into a full-fledged grocery store that Wright described a hybrid of Price-Rite, known for its low prices, and the Lexington Co-op, known for its locally sourced goods. 

Piccirillo has said the Highland area was ripe for the project, which lacks stores offering fresh meats, fruits and vegetables and is home to a community that struggles with access to transportation. The problem is more acute during snow storms like those recently experienced in the area, Piccirillo said. 

"It is a food desert in this neighborhood," he said. "On weekends like we just had, it's more than that. It's impossible to get access food if you don't have your own transportation in the weather we had. This store is going to change that."

Task force co-chair, Brian Archie, said his involvement in the group – supported by the state Health Foundation – provided him a new education about the community he lives in and the food he eats.  

For many, "your circumstance is your circumstance, and what you go through is what you go through," Archie said. He hopes those putting the plan into action can change that.