NATCHEZ — It’s time to get healthy.

With the help of the Clinton Foundation and an army of lifestyle coaches and health advocates, the City of Natchez is planning to do just that.

In May, the Clinton Health Matters Initiative released a Blueprint for Action document, detailing its strategy for improving the overall health of Natchez and Adams County. The document includes what it calls “bold action steps,” as well as ways the foundation will measure each step’s effectiveness.

The Blueprint for Action is the result of the Clinton Health Matters Initiative bringing together “key stakeholders in the Natchez-Adams county area and setting local priorities,” the document states.

Natchez Mayor Butch Brown said the document was drawn up as a result of a series of meetings that involved members of the community, civic leaders and health professionals.

One of the action steps outlined in the document is passing a smoke-free ordinance in the City of Natchez by 2020 to reduce exposure to second-hand smoke by 20 percent.

Other steps the initiative hopes to take include educating Adams County youth about healthy sexual behaviors and reducing teen drug-related crime.

The initiative also seeks to develop a countywide trails plan to link to existing trails, as well as a plan for how to pay for them.

Brown said the city’s partnership with the initiative does not necessarily commit the city to these measures.

“There will be certain things we can agree to, like community gardens, that don’t require legislation,” Brown said. “On the other hand, making the city completely smoke free, there needs to be a lot more community input before something like that would be pursued and adopted.”

Brown said the non-controversial actions in the blueprint that don’t require legislative or administrative action would be made part of the city’s five-year plan with the initiative.

Clinton Health Matters Initiative Regional Director Getty Israel and Natchez Community Development Director James Johnston came before the board Monday to ask the city to hire independent contractors to man three of the Clinton Foundation’s Health Matters programs.

Johnston said the programs needed city approval because the city was awarded the grant by the Humana Foundation to fund the programs.

The three programs to begin in Natchez soon are the Healthy Moms, Healthy Babies program, Diabetes and Heart Disease Prevention, and the Million Hearts Program.

The Healthy Moms, Healthy Babies Program, coordinated by Rochelle Fields, is committed to the health and safety of women and infants from the time of the mother’s first trimester until the child is 3 months old.

Five coaches will host 25 women throughout their pregnancies. The program will include trained doulas and breastfeeding experts, and will educate mothers about proper nutrition while pregnant and nursing, labor and delivery, postpartum care and early childhood education.

Fields said the Miss-Lou is in particular need of the program.

“We have a high rate of premature birth, (sudden infant death syndrome) and C-sections in Natchez, especially among the African-American community,” Fields said.

Square Roots, A national organization focusing on maternal and infant health, was planning to purchase a house in Natchez to house the coaching program. However, A motion to approve a memorandum of understanding between Square Roots and the City of Natchez failed with a 3-2 vote by the Natchez Board of Aldermen at its specially called meeting Dec. 21.

Johnston said Square Roots would be reevaluating their position in Adams County as a result of the memorandum’s denial.

Fields said the Healthy Babies, Healthy Moms program would go on regardless.

“We are now looking for moms to join the program,” Fields said. “We can educate (women) about healthy pregnancy and how to take care of themselves.”

The Diabetes and Heart Disease Prevention Program is designed to help pre-diabetics or those at risk of developing Type 2 diabetes to prevent the development of the disease through intensive lifestyle changes.

Certified community health workers will be trained to administer the one-year program in eight Adams County area churches.

Participants will be invited to classes about healthy eating and weight maintenance as well as group exercise classes in the fellowship halls of the participating churches.

Program coordinator and personal trainer Larry Andrews is also a pastor at Pleasant Green Baptist Church in Woodville.

Andrews said he was overweight for much of his life, but was given a second chance to take care of his body.

The faith-based assembly approach to introducing these lifestyle changes is ideal, Andrews said.

He said his motto, based on Ecclesiastes 9:10, is meant to encourage his clients.

“Work smart, work hard, work long, and at the end of the program, when the year’s over with, work on,” Andrews says.

Demetric V. Felder, coordinator of the local Million Hearts Program, said the program was so named because the goal of the national initiative is to prevent 1 million deaths from heart disease, heart attacks and strokes.

Felder said Natchez was chosen as a site because of its demographics.

“We are essentially considered an elderly town,” Felder said. “Adams County was chosen specifically, not just because of poverty but because of the negative aspects of smoking and obesity as well. That makes this a prime site for the Million Hearts program.”

The Million Hearts program consists of four coaches providing heart disease education to groups at risk of developing heart disease or suffering a heart attack or stroke, Felder said.

Weight-loss education, blood pressure screening, and alcohol and tobacco cessation counseling will be administered in work sites, retail locations and churches.

“We are here for any employers, or churches who can set aside 30 or 40 minutes,” Felder said.

The coaches will be people who have been through the conditions or addictions themselves, Felder said. “They can identify with the failures as well as the successes.”

The program has been funded for the 2016 calendar year. Next year’s funding will depend on this year’s results.

“What we do today can change all of our tomorrows,” Felder said. “So let’s decide today.”