(HAMILTON) – New Jersey Department of Agriculture Secretary Douglas Fisher, along with USDA and local officials were among those today who recognized Rainbow Children’s Medical Day Care in Mercer County for its Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP) with a visit to its location in Hamilton as part of National CACFP Week.

Rainbow Children’s Medical Day Care is a preschool program for infants through 6 years old with special needs and medical disabilities and has a capacity for 27 children, and currently has openings available. Rainbow Children’s is one of only seven pediatric medical day care centers in the state of New Jersey.

“Rainbow Medical Day Care’s CACFP serves nutritious infant meals that set a standard for other similar programs,” Secretary Fisher said. “The individualized attention these children receive is an excellent example of the types of service that First Lady Tammy Murphy emphasizes through Nurture NJ, which focuses on improving outcomes for maternal and infant health to make New Jersey the safest and most equitable state in the nation to deliver and raise a baby.”

Rainbow Children’s Medical Day Care was presented with a CACFP honor by Roberta Hodsdon, Director of Special Nutrition Programs for the USDA’s Mid-Atlantic Regional Office.

“We are proud to present the FNS Mid-Atlantic Region CACFP Champion Award to Rainbow Children’s Medical Day Care,” said Dr. Patty Bennett, Food and Nutrition Service Mid-Atlantic Regional Administrator. “We believe that children need consistent access to nutritious foods to be healthy now and throughout their lives and we applaud the work by the dedicated center staff to serve nutritious meals and snacks prepared onsite to the children using resources from our Child and Adult Care Food Program.”

Rainbow Children’s has a high-functioning, fully equipped kitchen where two meals and a snack are prepared onsite each day. The staff serves special meals to all children and administers medication and therapies. Usually there is an individualized special meal for each child due to dietary restrictions.

“Through the support of the USDA and the State, our mission is being realized,” Rainbow Children’s Administrator Patti Sullivan said. “We understand the special needs of each child that is entrusted to our care and strive to provide a positive and enriching atmosphere.”

In New Jersey, the CACFP provides meals and snacks to nearly 92,000 eligible participants at shelters, licensed childcare centers, registered family childcares, after-school care programs and adult care centers with more than 700 sponsors. The program is federally funded and administered by the New Jersey Department of Agriculture.

Nationally, childcare providers and centers participating in CACFP implement funding for more than 2 billion meals and snacks to nearly 5 million children daily and nearly 140,000 elderly persons in adult day care. The CACFP also provides support to parents who choose to breastfeed, by encouraging them to provide a supply of breastmilk for their infant in daycare or use a quiet, private area within the center to directly breastfeed their infant on-site.

National CACFP Week is in the spring each year and is an educational and informational campaign designed to raise awareness of how the Child and Adult Care Food Program works to combat hunger. The program brings healthy foods to the table for adults in day care and children in childcare homes, centers, and in after-school feeding programs across the country.

To learn more about New Jersey’s Child and Adult Care Food Program, visit http://bit.ly/1FwqWwB or call 609-984-1250. To learn about Nurture NJ go to https://nurturenj.nj.gov.

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