Massachusetts Dietetic Association
Please contact the following board members with any legislative or Public Policy issues:


Vanessa Ludlow, RD, LDN
Vanessa.Ludlow@childrens.harvard.edu
MDA Legislative Director

Cynthia Taft Bayerl, MS, RD, LDN
CTBayerl@yahoo.com
Legislative Director-Elect

Colleen Timmons, MS, RD, CNSD, LDN
colleenemccormack@yahoo.com
Legislative Network Coordinator

Dietary Guidelines
Dietary Guidelines for Americans has been published jointly every 5 years since 1980 by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Department of Agriculture (USDA).  The Guidelines provide authoritative advice for people two years and older about how good dietary habits can promote health and reduce risk for major chronic diseases.  They serve as the basis for Federal food and nutrition education programs.

Dietary Guidelines for Americans 2005 http://www.healthierus.gov/dietaryguidelines/ was released January 12, 2005, by HHS Secretary Tommy G. Thompson and USDA Secretary Ann M. Veneman.

Development of the Dietary Guidelines is coordinated by HHS's Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion http://odphp.osophs.dhhs.gov/ and USDA's Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion http://www.usda.gov/cnpp/ and Agricultural Research Service http://www.ars.usda.gov/ .

For more useful, up to date information on a variety of food and nutrition topics, visit the ADA website www.eatright.org.

ADAPAC: ADA's Political Action Committee -http://adapac.org
ADAPAC is one of the top 15 national health care professional Political Action Committee (PAC) in the country. It is the only political action committee dedicated to promoting food, nutrition, and health. The website provides general information on ADAPAC, describes how ADA members can get involved, lists ADAPAC activities, including local fundraisers, and provides an ongoing list of the federal candidates ADAPAC has contributed to since January of this year. Contact information for the ADAPAC is located on the website for members who have an issue that they want addressed, or if they want to identify a federal candidate to ADAPACís for campaign support. Questions for ADAPAC may be directed to adapac@eatright.org or Mary Lee Watts at (202) 775-8277.


Get Involved
For ways to become more involved with legislation and ADA / MDA, go to the ADA web site: (http://www.eatright.com/gov/tools.html will get you directly to the Grassroots Tools page. Sign up to receive “On the Pulse” (contact pulse@eatright.org to sign up).