Child and Adult Care Food Program, Promoting Health and Wellbeing for All New Yorkers

Department of Health Receives Over $246 Million to Support Healthy Meal Assistance Program

ALBANY, N.Y. (June 01, 2018) - The New York State Department of Health today announced that it received more than $246 million in federal funds to support the State's robust Child and Adult Care Food Program. The Child and Adult Care Food Program is a nutrition education and meal reimbursement program helping providers serve nutritious and safely prepared meals and snacks to children and adults in day care settings.

"The Department's Child and Adult Care Food Program has a rich tradition of helping families across the state obtain healthy meals at no cost," said Commissioner of Health Dr. Howard Zucker. "By securing these federal dollars, we are able to continue to provide this invaluable program to our residents that depend on these services."

There are currently more than 1,380 sponsoring organizations representing 13,500 licensed or registered center-based or family day care sites participating in New York's Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP) statewide. On average, day care providers serve approximately 542,500 meals to children and adults at CACFP-participating facilities in New York State each day. In 2017, New York received more than $246 million in federal USDA funds for this program.

Participating programs include:

  • Child care centers, including Head Start centers and outside school hours programs serving children up to 12 years of age;
  • Community-based adult day care centersthat are approved by federal, state or local authorities to provide day care services to adults with disabilities;
  • After-school programsproviding educational or enrichment programming for children up to 19 years of age;
  • Homeless sheltersproviding meals to children living with a parent or guardian; and
  • Family day care programsincluding licensed, registered and legally exempt home-based caregivers serving children up to 12 years of age.

The level of support for free or reduced-price meals is based on household income as follows:

INCOME ELIGIBILITY GUIDELINES FOR CENTER-BASED CARE
(Effective July 1, 2017 until June 30, 2018)
HOUSEHOLD SIZE FREE MEALS     REDUCED-PRICE MEALS
YEAR MONTH WEEK YEAR MONTH WEEK
1 15,678 1,307 302 22,311 1,860 430
2 21,112 1,760 406 30,044 2,504 578
3 26,546 2,213 511 37,777 3,149 727
4 31,980 2,665 615 45,510 3,793 876
5 37,414 3,118 720 53,243 4,437 1,024
6 42,848 3,571 824 60,976 5,082 1,173
7 48,282 4,024 929 68,709 5,726 1,322
8 53,716 4,477 1,033 76,442 6,371 1,471
FOR EACH
ADDITIONAL
FAMILY
MEMBER
+5,434 +453 +105 +7,733 +645 +149

A list of the participating programs may be obtained at https://health.data.ny.gov/Health/Child-and-Adult-Care-Food-Program-Participation/dmn7-mpa8 or by calling the New York State Health Department (NYSDOH) at (800) 942-3858.

The New York State Department of Health annually receives funding from the federal government to support and enhance CACFP.

CACFP is funded through the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and continues New York's commitment to promote the health and well-being of its residents. All children and adults who attend programs that participate in CACFP receive the same meals at no additional charge. There is no physical segregation of, or other discriminatory action against, any child or adult attending a CACFP-participating program because of race, color, national origin, age, sex or disability.