Changes to Reduce 1.5 Trillion Calories by 2015

Washington, DC – First Lady Michelle Obama today announced that the Partnership Tiffany Bracelets a Healthier America has signed an agreement with The Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation (HWCF) whose members are pledging to take actions aimed at reducing 1.5 trillion product calories by the end of 2015. As an interim step to this goal, HWCF will seek to reduce calories by 1 trillion in 2012.

“Solving the obesity epidemic requires far more than anything government can do alone and today’s announcement represents an important step forward to providing Americans with healthier choices so that they can choose to lead healthier lives,” said Mrs. Obama, who also serves as honorary chair of the Partnership. “This is precisely the kind of private sector commitment we need. I want to thank the Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation for stepping up to the plate and I hope this encourages others to do the same.”

“On behalf of the Partnership, I am pleased to acknowledge this major first step by the Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation. Pledges like this one – with targeted and achievable results that are meaningful and measurable – will help us reach our goal of curbing childhood obesity within a generation,” said Dr. James R. Tiffany Pendants III, chairman of the Partnership’s board of directors.

Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation manufacturing companies will pursue their calorie reduction goals by growing and introducing lower-calorie options; changing product recipes where possible to lower the calorie content of current products; or reducing portion sizes of existing single-serve products. These changes will help Americans reduce their calorie intake, improve their overall nutrition and close the energy gap.

Through pledges like this, the Partnership is working to mobilize the private sector, thought leaders, media, and local communities to undertake actions that will further the goals of First Lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! campaign to curb childhood obesity within a generation. To ensure that the Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation stands by its pledge, the Partnership will work with the organization and the data it collects to monitor progress towards fulfilling its commitment on an annual basis.

“Accountability is a critical element of our agreement with the Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation. These types of calorie reduction efforts can have a significant impact on the obesity trend, so we want to be sure that organizations making commitments are following through with real results,” said S. Lawrence Kocot, interim President and CEO of the Partnership and a member of its board of directors.

The Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation is working to promote ways to help Americans achieve healthy weight by balancing the energy (calories) they consume with the energy they expend through physical activity. HWCF focuses on increasing access and opportunities for physical activity, healthier nutrition Tiffany Earrings and raising awareness of the energy balance approach – in the marketplace, in the workplace and in schools.

“The First Lady has shown tremendous leadership in calling for national action to end child obesity,” said David Mackay, chair of the Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation and CEO of Kellogg Company. “Through this effort, Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation member companies will further strengthen their emphasis on healthier food options to better help consumers achieve and maintain a healthy diet.”

To assess the impact of the pledge, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) will support a rigorous, independent evaluation of how the Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation’s efforts to reduce calories in the marketplace affect calories consumed by children and adolescents. RWJF will publicly report its findings.

About the Partnership for a Healthier America

The Partnership for a Healthier America is an independent, nonpartisan organization that will mobilize broad-based support for efforts to solve the child obesity challenge. Core activities of the Partnership include:

* – Developing a strong membership network of leaders across sectors with Tiffany Necklaces to scaling meaningful and measurable solutions;

* – Convening members annually to affirm, align, and announce commitments;

* – Promoting broad understanding among all sectors about the role healthy food, physical activity, and the environment play in reversing the childhood obesity epidemic;

* – Facilitating and measuring the impact of members’ commitments against clear and transparent targets; and

* – Connecting potential partners in the private and nonprofit sectors to each other and to the correct points of contact in government to ensure efficient leveraging of actions, and sharing of knowledge and lessons learned at the community, state, and national levels.

The Partnership emerged out of a series of conversations between The California Endowment, Kaiser Permanente Fund for Community Benefit, Nemours, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, and the Alliance for a Healthier Generation, which is a partnership of the American Heart Association and the William J. Clinton Foundation. Sonnenschein, Nath and Rosenthal, LLP has provided operational and legal support in establishing the Foundation. The Brookings Institution has also contributed thought Tiffany Rings to the effort. For more information, visit www.aHealthierAmerica.org.

About the Let’s Move! Campaign

The First Lady’s nationwide initiative seeks to solve the challenge of childhood obesity, so that America’s youngest children reach adulthood at a healthy weight. Her plan offers four pillars:

* – Offering parents the tools and information they need to make healthy choices for their kids;

* – Getting healthier food into our nation’s schools;

* – Ensuring that all our families have access to healthy, affordable food in their communities; and

* – Increasing opportunities for kids to be physically active, both in and out of school.

The Partnership will support these pillars through a campaign to unite and inspire families from every corner of the United States to take real and sustained actions to eat better, be more active, and make a commitment to embracing healthier lifestyles. For more information, visit www.letsmove.gov.

About the Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation

The Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation is first-of-its kind coalition that brings together more than 80 of the nation’s largest retailers, non-profit organizations, food and beverage manufacturers and trade associations aimed at helping to reduce obesity. The calorie-reduction initiative is part of a multi-pronged Tiffany Money Clips by the Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation and its members to help American families reduce the calories they consume while increasing the calories they expend. For more information, visit www.healthyweightcommit.org.

This year it will be even more as she celebrates her 100th birthday on that date.

A resident of Manassas, Eloise was born on Valentine’s Day 1909 to James Buchanan Ashby and Rebecca Owens Ashby.

The things she has been able to see since her birth in Haymarket are simply amazing — her family (Ashby’s) were one of the first to settle in Prince William County.

She remembers life without refrigeration, telephones, cars, planes and computers.

“Even the coming of the radio was a big thing in my life,” Thomas said.

She lived through the great depression in New York City where she raised her children prior to returning to Valentine’s Day gift Haymarket in the very home where she was born.

Eloise recalls living in Haymarket with her parents and two brothers, James Fowler Ashby and Henry Wesley Ashby and going to school in Clifton.

“Each Sunday evening Fowler and I were taken to Clifton where we would spend the week with relatives Clay and Eula Fletcher,” she said. “On Friday evening, our father would pick us up and return to Haymarket as our parents were unable to commute each day to the school.”

At the age of 16, she began to drive — the first car she drove was a 1925 Ford Model T.

In 1929, Eloise left Haymarket for New York City where she lived with her grandmother and worked for Guarantee Trust Company from 1929 to 1939.

She met Harold Duke Sheehy on a blind date in 1937. Prior to meeting Eloise, Sheehy thought he was a confirmed bachelor. She convinced him otherwise and they married in 1939 and moved to Jackson Heights, N.Y. They lived during the Great Depression and she still recalls the bread lines, people selling pencils on the street and the rationing of bread and butter.

He worked for Morgan Guarantee Trust Company in New York for more than 50 years and during the Depression he would say he was happy to have a job. Upon his retirement, the couple moved back to Haymarket. Their house had been the general store built by Eloise’s father, which they added to and converted into their home. Harold Sheehy died in 1972.

The couple had three children, Elinor, James and Henry.

Their daughter, Elinor, was born in 1941. Elinor married Walter Kyiacou in 1964 and have two children, valentines gifts Matthew, born in 1966, and Kelly, born in 1970.

Son James was born as the war was ending in 1945. He married his first wife, Camille Priola, in 1967. They have two children, Laura, born in 1970, and Lisa, born in 1974. James married Kim Shanks in 1986 and their son, Ryan, was born in 1991.

Son Henry died at an early age.

Great grandchildren, Anna and Connor Delaney (Laura and Tim’s children) and Cameron Roach (Lisa and James’ son) fill Eloise’s heart with joy.

Eloise met her second husband, Louie Borher Thomas, in 1973. They married July 1, 1974.

They lived at Thomas’ farm in Manassas and a few years later moved to Haymarket. They were married for 10 years before he died in 1984.

Eloise at one time lived in the house and farmed the land that was the old club house and golf course now known as Evergreen Country Club. Louie Thomas has one daughter, Betty, who is married to Peter Anastasi and resides in Manassas.

(Betty and Peter have two children, Rodney and Ellen. Ellen and her husband, Jack Patterson, moved into the family home in Haymarket after Eloise relocated to Manassas. They have a son, Andrew, 9, whom Eloise said she enjoys chatting sports with.)

Eloise said she grew up a “tomboy.” She said competing and wrestling with the boys made her arms so strong “that I cufflinks can still carry out my garbage bags.”

She walks without assistance, lives by herself in an apartment, pays her own bills and cooks her own food. Every Sunday during football season you can find her in front of her television set anxiously waiting to watch a Washington Redskins game.

In the kitchen, Eloise said she likes to cook with “vegetables being [her] favorite.” Eloise said she cooks so many carrots, “Many people tease me that I shouldn’t even be wearing glasses since they are suppose to be good for your eyesight.”

Betty Anastasi takes her grocery shopping and to church each Sunday at Trinity Episcopal Church.

Eloise said she enjoys traveling and often traveled with the residents at the Senior Center in Manassas.

“One of the biggest excitements in my life was going to Niagara Falls and going under the falls in the boat,” she said. She also has enjoyed trips to Nashville to see the country stars with Minnie Pearl and Vince Gill being among her favorites.

Thomas said no particular Valentine’s Day stands out in memory, noting, however, “no one forgets my age.” She has no secret to her longevity, “saying I just keep active.”

She is a serious collector, having shelves full of items such as small pitchers, tea pots, owls, little mugs, bud vases and vinegar cruets. She also grows green plants and flowers in her apartment.

Eloise has high praise for both of her late husbands.

“We never had a fight. If everyone got along as well as we did, there wouldn’t be any divorces in this country,” she said.

Early in her life, Eloise said she thought she might want to become a hair dresser or artist “but I changed my mind.” money clips She said the only thing she might have changed in her life was “I always liked to write, and considered being a writer but didn’t have the education.”

She concluded, however, “that I’ve had a great life with no health problems and no regrets.”

Family and friends will celebrate Eloise’s 100th Valentine’s birthday Feb. 14 at Evergreen Country Club.

Staff writer Bennie Scarton Jr. can be reached at 703-369-6707.

The important mission of inspecting these commodities rests with Customs and Border Protection agriculture specialists. Although cut stem flowers are not imported through Baltimore, Baltimore was ranked 4th nationally in cocoa bean imports during 2008, emphasizing the importance of this enormously critical mission.

“Although these items appear to be harmless, there could be hidden threats in those shipments of fresh flowers and cocoa beans that could seriously threaten U.S. agriculture, our natural resources and our economy,” said Thomas Winkowski, assistant commissioner for the CBP’s office of field operations. “CBP’s highly trained agriculture specialists ensure that plant diseases and even microscopic plant pests are detected and prevented from being introduced into the United States where they could cause harm.”

Nearly 27 million kilograms of cocoa beans were imported through Baltimore during 2008, representing about 8 percent of national cocoa bean imports, the 4th most in the U.S. ( Protecting America’s Agricultural Resources Photography )

Philadelphia leads the nation in cocoa bean imports. More than 220 million kilograms of cocoa beans, representing 65 percent of all U.S. cocoa bean imports, arrived to maritime ports in Philadelphia and Chester, Pa., primarily from West Africa during 2008. Chester, alone, is ranked 3rd nationally with almost 33 million kilograms in cocoa bean imports.

Sandwiched between Philadelphia and Chester is the port of Newark, N.J. Newark imported more than 72 million kilograms, approximately 21 percent of the nation’s cocoa bean imports. Including Baltimore, these top four ports accounted for nearly 85 percent, more than 310 million kilograms, of the nation’s total cocoa bean imports during 2008.

Once inspected and cleared by CBP agriculture specialists, these beans ship to chocolatiers throughout the region, who morph them into popular brand name chocolate treats.

Nationally, CBP processed approximately 340 million kilograms of cocoa beans during 2008. The following are interesting facts about cocoa beans and CBP’s role in safeguarding these soon-to-be delicious imports.

The top 10 ports of entry that processed shipments of cocoa bean imports are Philadelphia, Newark, N.J.; Chester, Pa.; Baltimore; San Francisco; New York; Miami; Seattle; Champlain-Rouses Point, N.Y.; and Los Angeles.

Most of the cocoa beans are shipped from the Africa, primarily from the Ivory Coast, but also from Nigeria, Togo, Ghana, Cameroon, Madagascar; and Tanzania.

Western hemisphere cocoa bean export nations include Dominican Republic; Ecuador, Haiti, Peru; Panama; Grenada; Jamaica; and Trinidad & Tobago. Other export nations include Indonesia; Papua New Guinea; France; and Switzerland.

Mold, moths and beetles are the most common threats to cocoa bean shipments.

The port of Baltimore does not process cut stem flowers. The closest port that does is Philadelphia, which ranks 11th nationally in processing cut stem flowers.

More than 3 million cut stem flowers were imported from South America, primarily from Colombia, through the port of Philadelphia during the first six weeks of 2008, which is considered the Valentine’s Day season.

Miami, the nation’s runaway leader in processing cut flowers, imported approximately 380 million flower stems. In comparison, Laredo, Texas, the nation’s 2nd leading cut flower port of entry, processed less than 27 million stems.

During 2008, CBP processed approximately 500 million cut flower stems during the tiffany and co Valentine’s Day season. Here are other facts about CBP’s role in safeguarding cut flower imports.

The top 10 ports of entry that processed shipments of cut flower imports for last years Valentine’s Day are Miami; Laredo, Texas; New York; Otay Mesa, Calif.; Los Angeles; Newark; Chicago; Wilmington, Del.; Boston and San Juan, Puerto Rico.

Most of the cut flower shipments are imported from South America, primarily Colombia.

The top three cut flower imports are mixed bouquets, dianthus and chrysanthemum.

The most common type of insect found in cut flower imports is the Lepidoptera larva (moth).

“CBP takes very seriously our critical mission of protecting American agriculture against harmful insect pests and plant diseases that could cause severe consequences to our nation’s vital crops, farming industry and to our economy,” said James Swanson, CBP Port Director for the Port of Baltimore.

“If, in the course of protecting the nation’s agriculture, we help families, friends and couples express their money clips love for each other, so much the better,” said Swanson.

At international ports of entry, land borders and mail facilities, CBP agriculture specialists are the front line in the fight against the introduction of harmful insects and diseases into the United States. On a typical day in fiscal year 2008, the 2,277 agriculture specialists employed by CBP seized 4,125 prohibited meat, plant materials or animal products, including 435 agricultural pests at ports of entry.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection is the unified border agency within the Department of Homeland Security charged with the management, control and protection of our nation’s borders at and between the official ports of entry. CBP is charged with keeping terrorists and terrorist weapons out of the country while enforcing hundreds of U.S. laws.For more information about US Fed News contract awards please contact: Sarabjit Jagirdar, US Fed News, Email:- htsyndication@hindustantimes.com.

And, the $40 billion jewelry industry is hoping, addictive. Indeed, since maker S&R Designs introduced its first pieces, in 2001, the line has expanded to more than 400 charms, from about two dozen. And in the five months since Honora, a New York maker, launched its line of slide-on charms, they’ve come to account for 70% of its fine-jewelry business. Stores, too, are betting big on them. “We’re starting our advertising blitz,” says jeweler Nancy Brown, who just got clip-ons into her Santa Fe, N.M., shop last month.

The bracelets are just the latest take on the dangly charm bracelet, which first became tiffany and co popular around World War II and makes a comeback every decade or so. (The big news this time: No jingling.) And industry watchers say they’re also part of an overall trend toward interactive jewelry that women can change around to fit their mood — remember last year’s Nomination bracelets? — or just play with. Even high-end Cartier is coming out with interactive pieces this year, including a jeweled turtle charm with retractable head and legs.

But that will set you back about $15,000. One of the big selling points for the clip-on charms is that while they can add up — they range from $225 for a small letter to $2,000 for a half-dollar-size, diamond-encrusted peace sign, and it takes anywhere from three to 12 to make a bracelet — they’re modest enough that women feel comfortable buying for themselves. Still, says Mark Silverman, owner of Matthew’s Jewelers in Plantation, Fla., where women make up most of the bracelet buyers, the biggest seller is decidedly romantic — hearts. (“People are sentimental,” he says.)

And you could soon be seeing them on even more wrists. This month, Honora is introducing a line of sterling-silver charms for $145 a pop. Rhinestone knockoffs are already cropping up in New York’s funky East Village, with prechosen charms on leather or rubber straps going for $20 to $50.

That’s where Valerie Lokaj, the floor manager at a Manhattan hair salon, got her bracelets, which spell money clips out things like “XOXO” and “LOVE.” “I came home and my sister thought I’d gone to Fendi,” she says. But even at these prices, the knockoffs can add up — if, like Ms. Lokaj, you buy 15 of them in a month.

The rubber bracelets will be inscribed with the letters “BFF” — Best Friends Forever — in honor of Skyla Jade Whitaker, 11, and Taylor Paschal-Placker, 13.

Both were shot to death June 8 while walking along County Line Road, four miles northeast of Weleetka.

No arrests have been made in the case.

According to school officials, the bracelets will be purple and green — cufflinks Skyla’s and Taylor’s favorite colors.

Both were known at school as sweet, loving girls. Together they served on the school’s cheerleading squad, and Skyla was on the basketball team.

The two also were active in 4-H and Students Working Against Tobacco.

Taylor, a straight-A student, would have been entering the seventh grade, while her best friend, Skyla, would have been entering the sixth grade.

School Superintendent Dusty Chancey said he doesn’t anticipate the need for grief counselors

for students when classes resume at 8:40 a.m. Thursday after the summer money clips break.

However, Chancey said teachers will meet with a psychologist on Wednesday and pose questions to the counselor, dealing with specific student concerns.

He said the teachers will be able to use the responses from the psychologist for students still troubled by the slayings.

Otherwise, Chancey said, if more therapy is needed, professional counselors will be brought to the school.

But the superintendent is expecting a rather peaceful scene at the school on Thursday and Friday, as students get acquainted with new classmates, new teachers and new class schedules.

“I expect it to be real quiet. We’re going to try to get back to a routine; trying for normalcy,” Chancey said.

Chancey said teachers held workshops Tuesday, and each educator was given a bracelet to wear in honor of Skyla and Taylor.

Including Chancey, the school system has a dozen teachers for about 100 students.

The independent school system — kindergarten through the 12th grade — is located along Oklahoma 84, about seven miles east of Weleetka.

It serves a 48-square-mile area, taking in students from the rural areas around Weleetka, Dustin and Henryetta.

The school is not very far from County Line Road (N. 3890 Road) where the lifeless bodies of Skyla and Taylor were found in a shallow roadside ditch on that Sunday afternoon in June.

Both had been shot several times in the head and body. Authorities believe two killers were involved, because each of the girls was shot with two different caliber of bullets.

The killings outraged the nation and drew international attention.

Skyla was visiting Taylor at her home, and, as they often had done, decided to go for a pendants walk along the road to the Bad Creek bridge, about a half-mile from the Placker residence.

Investigators said the girls had reached the bridge and were heading back to Taylor’s home when they were ambushed.

They left for the walk around 5 p.m. that day, and their bodies were discovered some 30 minutes later by Taylor’s father, Peter Placker, less than 1,000 feet from his home.

Authorities are still hard at work on the case, chasing more than 500 leads, along with having questioned more than 100 people, with many more interviews to go.

Because of the remote location of the murder scene, investigators with the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation believe the killers live in the area.

Meanwhile, as the investigation goes on, a memorial to the girls — bearing flowers, photos, stuffed animals and crosses — continues to grow at the murder scene.

Manny Gamallo 581-8386

manny.gamallo@tulsaworld.com