Support... Our Results

Impact

• A November 2002 Center policy brief and subsequent fact sheet on the number of Californians at risk for, or suffering from, hunger led to legislative action. Using 2001 data from the Center's California Health Interview Survey (CHIS), authors led by Dr. Gail Harrison, concluded that more than 2.2 million low-income California adults cannot always afford to put food on the table, and nearly one in three of these adults - 658,000 -experiences episodes of hunger. Advocacy groups, including the Los Angeles Regional Foodbank and California Food Policy Advocates, seized on the data to lobby for legislation. The bill was passed and signed into law. CHIS data have also spurred county supervisors in Los Angeles and in parts of Central California to take action. Read more
  
  
• Read how other organizations and agencies have used data from the Center's California Health Interview Survey

What People Say

• "The California Health Interview Survey will help us identify the many factors contributing to childhood obesity, and help us target our solutions so that we can have the greatest impact on behalf of children and adolescents."
  --Laura Leviton, Ph.D., Senior Program Officer, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
  
  
• "The California Health Interview Survey helps us better understand populations that constitute large percentages of the California population but are too small to monitor in national samples. This, and the valuable local estimates that CHIS provides, enhance national surveillance and make CHIS a model for state surveillance."
  --Nancy Breen, PhD, Economist, National Cancer Institute
  
  
• See CHIS in the COMMUNITY: California Health Interview Survey Has Become an Indispensable Tool, for more in-depth comments from:
  
  
  • Leona M. Butler, CEO, Santa Clara Family Health Plan
    
    
  • Michael Flood, Executive Director, Los Angeles Regional Foodbank
    
    
  • Kathleen Curtis, PhD, Director, Central California Center for Health and Human Services, California State University, Fresno
    
    
  • Holly J. Mitchell, CEO, Crystal Stairs, Inc.
    
    
• See additional comments from organizations using CHIS data

Awards

• Senior Research Scientist, Gail G. Harrison, PhD, received a 2007 Hunger Fighter Award from the California Hunger Action Coalition (CHAC), which stated: "Her work on exposing and publishing the statistical incidence of food insecurity and hunger in California has assisted advocates across the state to secure more resources for meeting low-income Californians' nutritional needs."
  
  
• The American Association for Public Opinion Research (AAPOR) presented its 2006 Policy Impact Award to the Center and its partners for the California Health Interview Survey (CHIS) as an outstanding example of how surveys can be used to improve policymaking and society.