Altarum provides policy research and evaluation support to several projects funded by the Michigan Department of Community Health that focus on promoting physical activity and healthy eating. For each of these projects, Altarum develops evaluation instruments and resources, provides evaluation technical assistance to community-based grantees, and details policy implications of evaluation findings:

• The Building Healthy Communities program is a multiyear grant program that funds local health departments to work with multisectoral coalitions of community partners to plan, implement, and evaluate community-based interventions to increase access to healthful food, opportunities for physical activity, and tobacco-free environments in an effort to reduce health disparities in low-income communities.

• The Complete Streets project provides grant funding to local health departments to implement CS ordinances in low-income communities to promote health equity and physical activity, and works towards achieving statewide policy change that supports CS.

• The Schools Implementing Nutrition Standards project provides grant funding to school districts to implement nutritional guidelines for all foods served on school campuses and is working towards statewide policy change that supports stricter nutrition standards in all Michigan schools.