Boston Moves for Health falls short of weight loss goal

Boston Mayor Thomas Menino challenged Bostonians to lose 1 million pounds as a part of his Boston Moves for Health campaign, which was launched in April 2012, but it seems to have fallen short, with the city only losing 95,697 pounds so far according to the campaign’s website.

“The real impact of the Boston Moves for Health campaign comes through in the free fitness classes our partners are offering to the community, the affordable weight loss resources for those in need, the activity competitions in schools and our efforts to make the healthy choice the easy choice,” Menino said in an email.

Menino said the city is not done in its pursuit to develop a healthier lifestyle.

“By all those measures, the campaign has been a great success, and we’re not about to let up,” Menino said. “This spring and summer will have even more great programming, like healthy cooking classes, the return of Hubway and Fitness on the Plaza.”

Boston was ranked the third healthiest city in the country, despite the fact that 22 percent of the city’s population is considered obese, according to the American College of Sports Medicine’s 2012 American Fitness Index.

Boston Moves Program Director José Massó said the main goal for the Boston Public Health Commission is to keep the city’s residents active and to be concerned about the overall health of Boston.

“The concern for the Boston Public Health Commission is keeping residents active, and the health the population,” Massó said.

As part of an initiative with the city of Boston to increase participation in the Boston Moves program, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts and Playworks are partnering to increase physical activity for Boston Public Schools students at more than 31 schools, according to a Blue Cross Blue Shield statement.

“By investing in Playworks, Blue Cross has exemplified how a company can work to improve both the community and their workforce,” said Playworks Executive Director Max Fripp in the press release. “Through creating shared values, our partnership has demonstrated results for both students and their associates.”

Massó said the programs offered by Boston Moves for Health were more important than the city’s meeting its weight loss goal.

“The campaign component was more on the lines of thinking about health, so in that regard we are really excited about the programs that we have been able to offer to city residents,” Massó said. “It also teaches a sustainable component that have really made this initiative exciting.”

Massó said he is working with the program to try to reinvigorate the campaign.

“We are doing that on a daily basis, such as establishing partnership programs and resources by getting the word out to the community,” Massó said. “That is why we do the partnerships, to establish ourselves in the community.”

Boston Moves for Health has partnered with various organizations in and around Boston to promote it’s goal of a healthier city. The organizations include the YMCA of Greater Boston, Playworks, Stop and Shop Supermarkets and Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts.

“We partnered with the YMCA to offer free classes which wrap up this week. So we are going to connect the amount of participation with previous numbers once the program finishes this week,” Massó said.

On campus, there appears to have been little effort to promote the campaign, said Jessica DiCristoforo a College of Communication sophomore. She works at the front desk at the Fitness and Recreation Center and said she did not notice anything major changes in programs.

“There always is an increase in people at FitRec after winter break” DiCristoforo said. “Over the past few weeks, from what I can tell, there definitely has been more people then usual.”

DiCristoforo said up to 4,000 people use FitRec daily. However, she said the increase in people is attributed to a new program at FitRec called Friends of BU, where friends of people affiliated with BU can use the gym.

“The marketing people are always trying to come up with new ways for people to find out about FitRec,” DiCristoforo said. “They have this new thing … where they have free fitness classes on Friday at 4 p.m. instead of having to pay for a fitness class or sign up for a PDP.”